


Storms, Sincline, and a Single Drop of Sincerity

by phoenixyfriend



Category: Girl Genius (Webcomic), Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Arranged Marriage, Canon-Typical Violence, Dubious Morality, F/M, It's an important point of catharsis, Listen they're both technically villains, Multi, Other, Patricide, Sadism, With tragic backstories sure but like... villains, You know... eventually, villains in love
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2020-07-03
Packaged: 2020-12-31 02:37:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 21,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21051998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/phoenixyfriend/pseuds/phoenixyfriend
Summary: Anevka Sturmvoraus was a princess, a spark, and a woman with dreams of patricide.Lotor was a prince looking for a way to keep studying a world chock-full of quintessence and the queerest technology he'd ever laid eyes on.They were not quite a match made in heaven, but hell was too afraid to let them in, so they'd have to make do with the stars themselves.





	1. Meet the Happy Couple

**Author's Note:**

> For Girl Genius Event Week 2019:  
Oct. 15: That one. You know... THAT one.

_It started when he saw the odd quintessence readings for a patch of space on the very edges of the empire. Twinned space, something that was always interesting but rarely useful, by Zarkon’s standards._

_Still. Twinned space was a rare enough novelty that he wanted to take a look. Rare and generally not useful, but Lotor had looked at so many readings over the years that he’d essentially gained a ninth sense for when something had the potential to be dangerous._

_He went alone._

_There was radiation at differing levels pulsing out from a star system, covering an expanse that was, at his best estimate, some three light-vargas across, and nearly spherical. He circled it, scanning all the way, and located the edges at which the way in changed. To approach the star head on would result in one aspect of the space. To approach it from behind would result in the other. The liminal edges were fuzzy and dangerous, but seemed to be angled at a disc-like radius a sixth of a turn from the star’s path._

_Once he passed the entry barrier, he would not be able to pass from one aspect to the other without exiting and circling the entire way around. He would need to choose carefully._

_The aspect approached from head on had a slightly below-average quintessence reading for a system that size._

_The aspect approached from behind had quintessence readings that were unnoticeable from a distance, but quite literally _astronomical _once he chanced to pass the edges of twinned space._

_The choice was made._

o.o.o.o.o

“—because Grandmother invited us there,” Tarvek was saying. “Yes, even Anevka.”

Anevka sped up on her way down the hall, ignoring the shuffle of the strongboys carrying her catafalque. Invited out of the castle? Even in her state? That was certainly… new.

“Something is going on,” Tarvek said. He sounded tired. Poor thing. He really needed to focus more on his training. “And Grandmother has decided it would be best for us to join her.”

“You can’t _leave,” _Father argued, glancing up when Anevka entered the room. “Anevka, please speak some sense into your brother. With our plans for the Lady, it would be far too dangerous for you to leave Sturmhalten.”

_Burn him buRn HiM BURN HIM **BURN HIM—**_

Anevka shrugged delicately. “Perhaps it would be more suspicious to _not _go. I imagine it would not do for another questor to visit us.”

Father ground his teeth, and Anevka blinked slowly as she waited for him to stop, imagining that she was grinding his bones instead.

“Fine,” he snapped. “You’ll go to Vienna. One week! No more.”

He spun on his heel and stomped out.

Anevka sidled up to Tarvek. “So, why does Grandmother want us to leave?”

“Other than how dangerous it is here?” Tarvek asked, an unhappy twist to his lips. “There’s an unexpected political opportunity. The Empire made contact with an unknown civilization, and it’s apparently large and powerful enough that there are plans for a ball, hosted by Grandmother, to engage in making connections with the visiting Prince.”

“Lost civilizations are discovered all the time.”

“Not lost. Unknown. We don’t have any spies close enough to know what’s going on yet, but Grandmother is trying to get as many of us as possible there.”

“Mm,” Anevka said, tapping her fingers to her arm. “I suppose we’ll be needing some dress clothes beyond what we already have?”

Tarvek’s fingers twitched, and his face lit up in a way he tried to hide. So cute. She knew him _far_ too well to fall for his spark-hiding. “Maybe… ahem, maybe one or two.”

“Let’s get to fitting, then.”

o.o.o.o.o

Anevka hung to the side of the room, watching the ball pass with critical eyes.

_Purple._

Prince Lotor was _purple._ My, he was practically a Jäger!

“All the cousins are trying to figure out if he’s angling for a political marriage,” Martellus said, sidling up to her.

“Seffie?” she asked.

Martellus grimaced and rubbed at the back of his neck. “She’s against it. His species apparently ages very slowly; he’s nearly seven thousand years old, by our time.”

“Unheard of, save for…”

“Albia, yes,” Martellus said. He looked at her from the corner of his eyes. “Most of them are planning to refuse, or at least attempt to. If he hasn’t had any children yet, he’s unlikely to want them within the next few decades.”

“They want to save themselves for a marriage where politics means childbearing, don’t they?” Anevka asked. “What of Henrietta? She said she’s no interest in children.”

“She doesn’t want to leave Berlin,” Martellus explained. “And Lotor is… well, apparently he lives so far that a visit more than once every year or two is impossible. Once every five is the likeliest, and even that’s the good version.”

“Problematic,” Anevka said. “I suppose the same would apply to most of the others, if children don’t factor in.”

“It does,” Martellus said. “You came late; they’ve been arguing the pros and cons for weeks now.”

“I see,” Anevka said. “And Grandfather?”

“He’s letting Grandmother take the reins,” Martellus said. He grimaced. “She’s as torn as the rest. She’d like for the ties made to benefit the family, of course, but she’s not very willing to take such a risk as marrying off one of the princesses. He’s largely unknown.”

“She believes he is what he claims, then?”

“Confirmed by Albia herself, according to the Baron,” Martellus said. He rubbed a hand over his face. “It’s a mess, I’ll tell you that. Not a thing I can do about it either.”

Anevka nodded slowly. “Of course, none of this really matters unless he _wants_ to marry someone, yes? He may wish to avoid it himself; we must seem like mayflies in comparison.”

“If only,” Martellus snorted. “Let’s find a Jägerwoman, that should do just fine…”

“So he _is_ interested, then?” Anevka prodded.

Martellus made a face and lifted a hand, tilting it from one side to the other. “Open to considering it, but he’s been very… cold, to most of the interested parties. Polite, but he’s spent more time discussing ethical political theory and metaphysics with the Baron and the Deep Thinkers than speaking with any interested young ladies.”

Anevka blinked slowly at him, and then inclined her head towards Tarvek’s interactions with Jessamine Dumont on the other side of the room.

“_Or_ young men,” Martellus said. He rolled his eyes. “Bartemius already tried, don’t worry.”

“Ah yes, he did try to destroy his reputation with a Jäger last year, didn’t he?”

“Don’t remind me,” Martellus groaned. He pressed the meat of his palm to his temple and massaged at the spot. “Grandmother had me putting _those_ fires out for weeks.”

“Literal?”

“I wish,” Martellus said. “No, she had me making alliances and backroom deals and bribing and threatening all the newspapers. Seffie looked about ready to snap by the end of it.”

“Oh, poor thing,” Anevka cooed. She laughed. “The price of being the star pupil.”

“She was seventeen,” Martellus said.

“Just the favorite, then,” Anevka said. “Grandmother’s always liked her best, and you know it.”

“I do…” Martellus said. He shot her a sidelong look, and then angled himself closer. Ah, he didn’t know about the sensitivity of the mechanical ears. Oh well. They were a strength that she wasn’t eager to share to anyone who passed, _especially_ not family. “Er, are_ you_ alright?”

“Whatever do you mean?”

He glanced back at the catafalque, and then at her eyes. “The… accident.”

It wasn’t an accident.

Everyone knew it.

(Everyone knew their father, after all.)

(Everyone knew _Anevka.)_

She blinked at him. “It’s been a year and a half, cousin. I’ve never been alright, and I never will be.”

He flinched.

Anevka laughed and patted his cheek. “It’s alright, dear. I never had the luck of being _anyone’s_ favorite. This was the consequence. I’ll just have to make up for it by being very, _very_ clever.”

She swanned away before he could come up with an answer.

The gears in her chest didn’t strain. Her stomach might have twisted with rage, had she still had any awareness of her human body, but… well. She didn’t, not really. Too many painkillers. Too many wires. Too many ways to keep her from feeling helpless and on fire.

(She hadn’t even been Tarvek’s favorite. _That_ had been Violetta since they were children, not that he let anyone know it. Anevka had been close, though.)

(Close enough that she owed him. She always would. He was stuck in the same hell as she was, and he’d done what he could to let her live, just a little longer. It could always fail but—but for now—it was—wa—_it was enough.)_

(She couldn’t breathe couldn’t breathe couldn’t couldn’t couldn’t and never would again, not _really.)_

Anevka beelined for the purple prince, the strongboys trotting to keep up with her. Was he talking to—oh, Seffie. Darling girl was putting on such a _brave_ face, really, but still. Best to nip this in the bud.

“Excuse me,” she said, and wished she could smile as the prince turned to her.

He didn’t do a double-take. Perhaps he’d already seen her earlier and prepared himself.

“Madam,” he said.

Anevka held out a hand and curtseyed, smooth and mechanically perfect. “Princess Anevka of Sturmhalten.”

He took it, if a little hesitantly, as though he’d only recently learned of the right way to respond in this manner of setting. Well, he _was_ rather foreign. He’d learned well enough, as evidenced by the kiss he pressed to the back of her hand. “A pleasure. I am Prince Lotor of the Galra.”

Anevka rose back to standing height and nodded. “_Enchanté._ I’m afraid I must deprive you of my cousin’s company. Her brother was looking for her.”

“What does Martellus want?” Seffie asked, narrowing her eyes suspiciously. “Wait, did he bring one of the dogs again? I _told_ him not to!”

“Go ask him yourself,” Anevka prompted, and watched in amusement as the girl stormed off in all her eighteen-year-old fury.

Faked, of course. She’d known a rescue when Anevka had offered it.

(Seffie hadn’t been old enough to help. Anevka did not hold this against her.)

(Much.)

“If I might ask you a question?” Lotor said, drawing her attention.

“Oh?”

“Was that brother actually asking for her, or were you simply taking a chance to pull her from my dastardly clutches?”

Anevka laughed, letting her head fall back just the slightest bit. Too stiff, too _blank,_ but something. “My, you are a perceptive one, aren’t you? Yes, Xerxsephnia is very good at this kind of game, but she is still young. I’m sure she has other things she’d rather be doing.”

He raised an eyebrow. “She seems it. Young, I mean.”

“If I may confess, I was also hoping to escape the brother,” Anevka said. “Martellus is the closest in age to myself, of the near family, but he can be a _dreadful_ bore, and I can’t say he’s very good at tact.”

Lotor nodded slowly. “I’ll take your word for it.”

Anevka looked past her shoulder and _drat the Baron was coming their way._ She dipped her head as though to look at Lotor through her lashes, had she still had her own face, and asked, “I don’t suppose you’ve learnt any of our dances since coming to our lands?”

“Not much, but I’ve been watching,” he said. “And I am a quick study. Am I to assume you wish to dance?”

“I wouldn’t dare to steal your valuable time.”

“A pity, I was rather hoping to move around a little more. Standing in one place and talking tends to be a bore.” He stepped back and, in a stilted imitation of the men around them, bowed and asked, “May I have this dance? If it would please the lady, of course.”

“It would,” Anevka said, taking his hand.

He drew himself back up and… hesitated. “Er… your… assistants?”

He was—oh. The catafalque. He’d spoken so smoothly she’d almost forgotten.

“The strongboys can keep up,” she dismissed. “They certainly have before.”

She’d just avoid spinning too much.

It was a slow waltz, something she could do without having to worry about tangling up her own wires. Lotor kept up as best he could, a little stilted but largely smooth. Clever man.

“So, I’m rather late to this whole situation; Father doesn’t like me leaving home in my state,” Anevka said. “Might I ask what it is that has people so interested in you and yours? I’m afraid that lost civilizations are discovered all the time around here, so I’m curious as to the cause of all the fuss.”

Lotor dipped her just a fraction of a second after the men around them dipped their partners, and spoke when he pulled her up straight again. “Does the term ‘extraterrestrial’ mean anything to you?”

Anevka blinked and tilted her head. “It does.”

Lotor smiled wanly. “I’m the prince of an Empire that spans multiple galaxies. My father is… not a kind man, and your planet is interesting in a way that would much appeal to him. I’d rather not see it fall into his hands.”

“You’re saying he’s destroyed entire planets before?” Anevka prodded.

“Yes,” Lotor said. He grimaced. “Oftentimes, he did it in ways that were… not just cruel, but pointless.”

“I’d love to hear more about how,” Anevka said.

“There is… a form of energy we use, inherent to all life we’ve found in the universe thus far,” Lotor said.

“Like ATP?” Anevka asked.

“No, though you are not the first to have made the comparison,” Lotor said. “It’s… difficult to explain without samples, or at least a frame of reference. But we use it to power our weapons and ships, and our own planet was long since destroyed, so we harvest it from others. There are ways to harvest it without killing the planet, to take just enough that the planet survives and, in the long term, produces more for use.”

“Ah, he’d rather take it all as quickly as possible,” Anevka guessed. “Prioritizing short-term gains over long-term consequences.”

“Precisely,” Lotor said. “Your world, now, is… it’s what we refer to as a twinned space. Two nearly identical objects occupying the same place and time, unaware of each other. Your world is part of a twinned space so large that it encompasses your entire star system.”

“Oh?”

“Entering from one direction brings you to one half of the system, and from the other to a different one,” Lotor told her. “One half has nearly no quintessence—the energy I mentioned earlier—while the other is overflowing with it.”

“Which side is ours?”

“The one that’s overflowing,” Lotor said. “And I’d rather not let him get his hands on it. He’s unlikely to look in this direction just because it’s a twinned space; Queen Albia seems to have the planet well hidden as far as quintessence goes. Eventually, though, he’ll notice it, and you’re all just interesting enough, full of oddities I’ve never seen before, that I want to see where your people will go, given time.”

“Flatterer,” Anevka accused.

“Truthful,” he corrected. “I don’t suppose you’re one of the sparks? I can’t help but find the entire array of neurotypes fascinating.”

“I… was,” Anevka said carefully. “There was an accident. My physical body is no longer capable of producing the amount of adrenaline needed to sustain a fugue, or to do much of anything.”

His eyes stayed trained on hers, not even flicking to the catafalque. “I see.”

“Do you consider yourself a scientist?”

“Absolutely.”

“What field?”

“Quantum physics, for the most part,” he said. “Some aerospace engineering. I’m afraid I’m not too invested in biology, but my chemistry is sound.”

“You’ve an interest in mechanical engineering?” Anevka prodded.

“Yes, and your world is absurdly dedicated to creating incredibly complex automatons without an ounce of code. I’ve seen some artificial intelligences; I was introduced to one, in Paris, but—” he shook his head. “I’m sorry, I got away from myself. Yes, I have an interest in mechanical engineering, especially what I’ve seen of it here.”

“Speak with my brother, then,” Anevka suggested. “He’s the one who built… well, built _me.”_

They came to a stop with the end of the song, and bowed to each other. “I will do so, madame.”

“Princess,” Anevka corrected.

“…your highness,” he said, with a hint of a smile. “I suppose I shall see you around?”

“If you must,” Anevka said.

They didn’t talk much for the rest of the evening.

o.o.o.o.o

“What would you do?” Grandmother asked. “If he decided he wanted to marry _you?”_

Anevka paused. She had a feeling that every girl her age was being asked this question. “I am… the most expendable, without being an insult in terms of breeding.”

“You would not object?”

“Only on the grounds of requiring maintenance from Tarvek. He’s the only one who knows the systems.”

Grandmother nodded and sat back, satisfied.

o.o.o.o.o

The Sturmvoraus children’s return home was without fanfare. They played their roles and appeased their father, and went about their business.

Then the messenger came.

“Your majesty! Prince Aaronev!”

Father looked up, irritation carved into his features. “What?”

“The—the Baron’s guest, Prince Lotor of the Galra Empire, he’s coming to visit!”

“What?”

Anevka tilted her head. “Whatever _for?”_

“We can’t reject him,” Tarvek muttered.

“We most certainly can!” Father argued.

“Baron’s guest,” Tarvek retorted, voice tired. “Probably as a cover for a questor. Can’t reject him without drawing suspicion.”

“It would be _more_ suspicious if he _found_ something!”

“Your majesty… he’s already _here.”_

Father’s face twisted, turning just a little red with rage. “What?!”

“He said that he sent word ahead but it must have gotten lost in the mail,” the messenger said. “He’s at the airship dock.”

“Let’s send a carriage,” Anevka said. “We can’t possibly turn him away now that he’s already here.”

Father’s jaw clenched tightly, and he gestured to the door. “So be it. But the two of you are responsible for entertaining him. I’ll have nothing to do with it.”

“Of course.”

Anevka and Tarvek dashed down to the lab and cleared up anything particularly odd or suspicious. Lotor would be interested in their experiments, more likely than not, and that meant they couldn’t have any hint of Geisters or the Lady.

“Ma-aster?”

Tarvek swore and turned. “Tinka. You’re up. I’m very sorry but we need you to stay in your—”

“Leave her,” Anevka said, largely on a whim. “He may have thoughts on how to… help.”

Tarvek turned from where he was trying to usher a very dazed Muse out of the room and eyed her. “He doesn’t specialize in microclockwork.”

Anevka shrugged. “A fresh perspective. What could be fresher than an extraterrestrial?”

Tarvek pursed his lips and nodded sharply. “I’ll find someone to watch her until we get down.”

Anevka slipped out of the room as Tarvek finished up with the final checks on the lab. He’d be careful enough not to miss any of the little things. She’d greet Prince Lotor.

She imagined that her heart was beating faster as she walked to the entryway. She spoke so rarely with anyone other than Tarvek, since the accident. Vienna had been a breath of fresh air, even if she’d—she’d—she’d been a disaster, really, everyone had been _staring_ and _watching_ and _whispering_ like couldn’t _hear_ the things they were saying about how she should have killed her father before he’d gotten to her and—

Anevka stepped into the foyer and let her eyes widen just enough to imply a smile she couldn’t truly make.

(She had a mouth, at least. She hadn’t at first, and she couldn’t use it to eat or speak or _anything_ but at least she—she looked a little more human. A little less broken.)

(A little less all-but-dead.)

“Prince Lotor!” She greeted. “I hadn’t expected to see you already here. I must apologize for my tardiness.”

“It’s quite alright,” he said. “I do believe that I’ve forgotten the proper way to greet you. Another kiss to the hand, perhaps?”

“I do believe it is,” Anevka said, holding out her hand and letting him bow over it to press his lips to the glove that covered her metal fingers.

There was something delightfully _invigorating_ about a man treating her not just like a person, but like a lady. No turn to address her state unless truly necessary and relevant. Just polite, vindicating courtesy.

She wanted more.

“Am I to assume that you are here to visit the labs and speak with my brother?” She asked.

“And miss out on your company? You must think very little of me,” he replied.

Oh, her heart would be _pounding_ right about now…

“Perhaps I can show you to the dining room. My brother should be joining us in a minute. Are there any foods we should avoid for your species?”

He looked at her sideways and… smiled? Genuinely? Odd. “Alcohol and capsaicin are the most common, as well as some proteins. I’ve a poison detector on my person to make sure it’s all something I can process with minimal trouble.”

_Clever_ boy. She almost wanted to coo and pat him on the head.

Dinner was a fine affair. Not _too_ fancy, on such short notice, but plenty enough for a royal’s meal. They chatted, and everyone politely ignored that Anevka’s plate remained empty and untouched. She dismissed her strongboys for the forty-five minutes, saying she’d send for them with a waiter when they were done.

There was a glint in Lotor’s eye when she did so. Hm. Had he expected her to keep them around for the meal?

Was he disappointed that she hadn’t?

Was he glad that she had?

She would have shaken her head if not for how it would have broadcast her thoughts to the world. She was being foolish. Why, she hadn’t acted _this_ besotted since she was fourteen! She wasn’t _Seffie,_ for Albia’s sake.

Maybe she just needed to vivisect something. The wailing would do her good.

“Shall we away to the labs?” She suggested, gears whirring in an effort to control her own thoughts. Atrocious sensibility, she just _had_ to get ahold of herself before she did something that made her look like an overgrown child.

“I don’t see why not,” Lotor said, standing up smoothly. He paused and offered her his arm. “Madame?”

She’d have smiled as charmingly as she could, had she still been able to.

The labs were neat and clean, with only a handful of odd, small, unobjectionable pieces lying around. She thought she spied the new hand Tarvek had been working on for her. Sweet child… he was going to be so easy to kill one day, if he kept it up.

Tarvek entered a low fugue, tightly wound and hyperaware of everything around him. Lotor watched with keen eyes, and Tarvek requested a few things in his Sparkiest Voice.

There weren’t any assistants nearby, so what he got instead was, upon grasping at empty air, the opportunity to look up and blink owlishly from behind those dreadful oversized goggles he wore when he needed to see while working with dangerous chemicals.

“I’m afraid I don’t know your terms that well yet,” Lotor said.

“I don’t feel like it,” Anevka said. She snapped open her fan and fluttered it demurely in front of the lower half of her face, as though it would hide anything at all.

Lotor looked at her sidelong, lips pursed in a way that she rather hoped was hiding a smile.

Tarvek made a face. “Can I borrow one of your strongboys?”

“They make for _terrible_ assistants, and no.”

Tarvek made a face and stalked over to the door, muttering under his breath.

“Did you _really_ just not want to?” Lotor asked quietly.

“He’s my little brother,” Anevka said. “And, well, he knows I have difficulty with such movement. The cables limit me.”

“Hm.” He eyed them critically. “I’ve seen radio technology in your world. You’ve some data transference methods that do not rely on a physical connection, do you not?”

“Nothing I would trust for something as complex as my thoughts and senses,” Anevka said. “They can transfer words and sounds, perhaps, but they are not consistent. They are not _reliable. _Besides, the matter of retro-integrating thoughts from a biological to a mechanical format is already tricky enough without adding another format shift.”

“Tricky how?” he prodded.

She looked at him sidelong as Tarvek bustled back into the room with a lab assistant in tow.

“Largely connecting to the neurological pathways in a manner that provides a constant connection instead of a snapshot at regular intervals,” Anevka said. She touched the back of her metal head. “My human body has had holes drilled into the base of the skull to accommodate the necessary wires for the brain stem.”

He made a face. “That seems rather… crude.”

She blinked at him, and then turned to Tarvek, who’d also looked up with—going by the way his hair was still settling—something of a snap to the motion.

“You have better ways at hand?” Anevka pushed.

“A few,” Lotor said carefully. “My people—we were using weapons that involve a certain degree of connecting to the weapon on a mental plane ten thousand years ago. Something on the scale of Voltron is rare, of course, but we’ve had time to refine the techniques. Doing so at a distance, building in sensation… it’s certainly achievable.”

Her breath would have caught, if it could have.

“We also…” he said, still more careful, “Have rather advanced medical care. I can’t promise anything, of course, especially since your species is so new to our systems, but I could look into the Altean technology I’ve seen, and the Galra upgrades, and—”

“What do you _want?” _Anevka snapped.

Lotor paused. “My apologies? I seem to have—”

“You are either taunting me with something I can’t have, or bribing me,” Anevka said. Gods be damned, she wished she could rip this frozen smile off and—and push him to the ground, pin his arms with her knees and _dig her thumbs into those squishy things he called eyes until he screamed for daring to make her have such useless hopes of being a person aga—_

“Let’s talk,” he said. “You’re not wrong, really, but—perhaps we should sit down?”

Anevka fumed. Literally, almost; she was rather sure the acrylics woven into her petticoat’s belt were close to melting.

“Let’s,” Tarvek said, rushing to Anevka’s side in as casual a manner he could and taking her arm in his. “Bira? You’re dismissed for now, but I may need you again soon.”

“Of course, your majesty,” the woman murmured, head ducking into a quick bow as she edge towards the servants’ door.

Anevka couldn’t feel Tarvek’s arm on hers, not really. There was a faint sensation of—of her gears not turning quite so easily, a read-out from a pressure plate that informed her there was resistance she’d not already set a default adjustment for as she did for her clothing each morning. It wasn’t feeling, not really, and—

_And Lotor said he could fix her could help her could find a way to make it better and oh if he was lying she was going to destroy him._

There was a sitting room nearby, just off the lab they’d shown Lotor. She didn’t sit, but took a place at a ninety degree angle to Lotor from Tarvek, so the alien prince couldn’t hope to keep both of them in his sights if he tried. The boys each took a seat in one of the plush chairs, and Anevka waited with what she hoped was the distinct air of a woman on the edge of a slaughter.

“So,” Tarvek said, after it became clear that neither Lotor nor Anevka was going to say anything. “You’re offering… medical help, and the option of enhancing the prosthesis.”

“Yes.”

“This isn’t likely to be a gift,” Tarvek said.

Lotor inclined his head. “No, it isn’t.”

“What do you want?” Tarvek asked outright.

“Do you normally make such direct—”

“No,” Anevka said. “But you’re going to. Now.”

He looked at her.

She’d have bared her teeth in a smile-that-wasn’t. She wished she could. She wanted to scare this man.

“I want continued access to this world,” Lotor said. “There’s a lot to be found here, both in terms of quintessence research, and in terms of the Spark. What you people do is, and I do not say this lightly, _incredible._ It is impossible. Much of your technology doesn’t come close to what is found on other planets, but the speed with which your culture is developing? It’s astounding and, again, _very much impossible._ Your stories on the Muses that inspired the prosthetic are—I don’t understand them, but everything I’ve seen here leads me to believe that it _must_ have happened. That it _must_ be true.

“Your world doesn’t have even a basic programming language, yet you have fully functional artificial intelligences and memory weaves. I need to know more, and to make a solid connection with a family that has that kind of access and resources? There would be no better way to perform the research that I hope will be enough to save my people without damning the rest of the universe.”

A _hero._

Ugh.

“And you wish to put us in your debt so we can provide you with the connection you need?” Tarvek said, voice carefully even and so very, very clearly fishing for the obvious reality of the question.

“Not quite,” Lotor said.

Tarvek quirked a brow, and leaned back in his chair. When had he gotten—ah, Veilchen must have been in the rafters, to give him the tea like that. It certainly gave Tarvek the dramatic air he craved.

“I would be willing to offer more,” Lotor said, fingers tap-tap-tapping at the arm of his chair. “Certainly, if I am to make ties to this planet, I would be aiding in its defenses. I would hardly want my father to have access to it.”

“The marriage would be but a blink of the eye to you,” Tarvek pointed out. He tapped the spoon to his cup. “Ten thousand years, you said, and still a young man by your standards.”

“There are… life-extending treatments,” Lotor said. They were circling, edging around the topic. “I’d have to access them in secret, but I could certainly use them.”

“And all you want in return… is to study us,” Tarvek said.

“To study your work.”

“Forgive me for not believing you,” Tarvek said, with a slight laugh.

“Say it,” Anevka ordered, voice too flat to be anything, _anything_ but machine.

Anything but the clank she was all but—all—she—

_“Say it,”_ she snarled.

“Did Grandmother put you up to it?” Tarvek asked, pulling Lotor’s attention back to himself.

“Princess Terabithia? No, though she was the one who suggested I consider it,” Lotor said. He smiled humorlessly. “She took notice of how easily I spoke with Princess Anevka.”

_“Say. It.”_ Anevka snarled, taking a step forward. “You showed no interest, so _say it_ and _explain.”_

Lotor turned to her, looked her in the eye, and said, “A marriage would be advantageous to both of us, and goodness knows your continent has been pushing to have me form one.”

She wanted to grit her teeth and close her fist around his neck and scream at him to tell her the truth and—

“And besides that,” Lotor continued, “I find you much more… tolerable? No, enjoyable, than most of the people I’ve spoken with that were held up as having enough—what was the term—blue blood? To qualify as a reasonable political marriage.”

“Our pedigree _is_ rather impressive,” Tarvek said, though he kept glancing nervously at Anevka, like Lotor _couldn’t_ see it as the plainest request for her to just _say something say something say something—_

Anevka stared stonily at Lotor.

Her hand twitched.

“You wouldn’t be able to handle me,” she said, as coolly as she could. “I’m House of Valois. We’re… a dangerous kind of girl to marry.”

“At minimum, you’d have to worry about family,” Tarvek said, face hidden partly behind his teacup. “They’re not entirely… averse to fulminicide.”

“…fulminicide?”

“Our family is so prone to killing one another that the word was coined after us,” Tarvek said. He took a sip, and… “Fulmin, fulminis: lightning. -cide, the ending for murder. Together, fulminicide: the murder of lightning, literally, and in usage, to mean the murder of an undefined family member.”

“Because you kill so many of your own,” Lotor said, brow quirked.

“Politics is a messy game,” Tarvek said with a shrug. “Anevka?”

She tilted her head. “I’d be in space, wouldn’t I?”

Lotor smiled humorlessly. “Much less of a risk, unless your family members have access to interstellar travel.”

Anevka took a step forward. “You had no interest in marriage. Why now?”

“It seems to be the manner of alliance your world, and this continent in particular, finds the most… trustworthy.”

Tarvek snorted.

“Why me?” Anevka asked.

“You… as I said, I enjoy your company more than the rest,” Lotor said. He kept his gaze on hers, steady and unerring. “The marriage would not be built on something so trite as love, but it would be tolerable. Survivable. Most pragmatically… pardon the bluntness, but you have the most to gain and the least to lose. The rest want to save themselves for marriages that produce children. They have expectations of schooling and wooing and many things that, by your own admission, you believe you no longer can enjoy as you might have. With me… you would be leaving everything behind, with rarer chances to visit, but you’d see the stars. You’d live longer. You would, if the healing works as planned, be able to… not to do everything you could before, necessarily, or look as you once did, but you’d regain some things you thought lost.”

“And you’d get a guinea pig,” Anevka said.

He didn’t gasp.

He did, however, purse his lips.

“Would you like to know why I’ve been so reluctant to speak?” Anevka asked, stalking closer. “Why I’ve let my child of a brother—”

“Hey.”

“—speak for me? Speak for my future marriage? Speak of using me as a pawn in the game of politics that spans galaxies?”

She reached Lotor and leaned forward until their noses nearly touched. “Would you know?”

He looked back evenly. “I would.”

“Because,” she whispered, so low she’d have said she’d breathed the words, had they not come from the grated speaker at the hollow of her throat. “I’ve been very careful to keep myself from making the mistake of killing you where you stand for giving me such fragile hopes.”

She put a finger to his chin, pushing it up so as to bare his throat, and tilted her own head. She held her other hand up and let the sparks of electric nightmares dance across her fingertips. “I’ve had to hold back so dearly to keep myself from frying you for the crime of letting me think I have a _chance_ of living without this wretched chassis limiting me to always and forever being the deepest shame of the fifty families.”

He blinked slowly, and _oh_ she could hear the rabbit-beat of his heart. Such a precious sound…

“My offer is solid,” he said. “I can _promise_ nothing for the healing, but I can promise the technology to, if nothing else, improve your life. You may not be what you once were, as I’ve no way of knowing how the human body reacts to my technology, but you will be _better.”_

She stood above him, listening to him breathe as they watched each other. He did not move but to breathe and to blink.

Moment.

Breath.

Wait.

Tense.

And.

“Grandmother would be happy,” Tarvek said, sounding distant and muffled to Anevka’s focus on the alien before her.

“I accept,” Anevka said. “But you’ll have to do _much_ better for the public proposal.”

She dropped her hand and stepped back. “Ask Tarvek for advice. He’s _quite_ the romantic.”

Pause. Think. Gearginding motion and still still still.

“I believe I shall introduce you to Tinka, if you will to learn of how my body is built.”

She left the room.


	2. Negotiations and Preparations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ah, love. True love. The feeling which... yeah, no. It's politics. And science. Dash of sadism. The works.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for... various things to do with Anevka's backstory should cover it. POV runs into a panic attack and triggers.

_He couldn’t say he truly liked her as a person. He didn’t know her very well, and she carried herself with a kind of cold pride and quiet cruelty. She was young by her people’s standards, an adult but not yet very long. Equal to him, in terms of development, despite the thousands of years between them. She was clever and sharp, in more ways than one, and the rage that so rarely bubbled to the surface was almost enchanting, in its own way. She kept such a tight lid on it, especially when she was around her father, but… well, she didn’t have much opportunity to show her emotions on her face, now did she? Her voice showed some things, but even that… she was good about hiding what wouldn’t do to be seen._

_Lotor was, possibly, wired to thrive on dysfunction. He was also possibly just honestly intrigued with this woman. He wasn’t unblooded himself by any means; ten thousand years was more than enough time to wet his sword a million times over. He didn’t enjoy it, but he’d known many who did, and he wouldn’t have befriended Ezor if he hadn’t considered this something he could look past._

_Maybe he just appreciated the fact that, when he dug deep into it, looked past all the circuitous dialogues and wispy rumors, she wanted to kill her father as much as Lotor wanted to kill his._

\--

Anevka sat ramrod straight. This was partly by choice, and partly by necessity; Tarvek had disabled some of the cogs in her back so he’d be able to work on her systems without there being a risk of an errant move damaging her while exposed like this. Twitching wrong while Tarvek worked with the microclockwork was a recipe for disaster, so they just did away with the problem altogether. It wasn’t pleasant, but it was necessary thing.

An array of mirrors hung above and about her, letting her see what Tarvek was doing. Furthermore, it let her see the reactions of her husband-to-be. Mostly, he had a look in his eye that she could compare easily to the most talented of non-Sparks. Dangerously intelligent and clever, a genius in his own right, but not _quite_ making the leaps in logic that defied nature and all expectations. She pitied him, because she knew that if he’d _had_ the spark, he’d have been an utterly amazing one, but his species likely just… wasn’t built for the reality-breaking mold of mind. So clever, so _intelligent_, so _old and clever,_ but limited, so limited, by the lack of spark.

What a _waste._

Tarvek kept up a running, quiet commentary on his actions, explaining what he was doing so that, if something _happened_ up there, maintenance could be done. Perhaps not enough to get her back in working order, but enough that if all else failed, Anevka could talk Lotor through it with the mirrors until they had a chance to get her back to Tarvek. Besides, it would be difficult to integrate the remote controls if Lotor didn’t even understand how she _functioned,_ wouldn’t it?

“I don’t suppose this miniature cogs could be integrated to the facial controls to allow for more delicate movements and expressions?” Lotor asked, voice low.

“I’m working on it,” Tarvek admitted. “That was put on the backburner. First I needed to focus the microclockwork on the cognitive functions and sensory input; the eyes alone were a very long project. After that came fine motor functions, the hands and gyroscopic balance. I still need to rework the knuckles to maintain pressure sensitivity without making it too difficult for the information itself to travel up. The more information…”

“If I know I’m squeezing too hard, it’s often too late,” Anevka explained. “Pressure information tends to arrive too late to be of any use, if we make it sensitive enough to manage glass. It works faster if we don’t need as much detail as that, but in that case, I wouldn’t be able to start on my own experiments again.”

“Exactly,” Tarvek said. “And obviously, the voice box. Cognition, communication, and independent movement took precedence, ultimately. Facial expressions were less important, really, especially since I can’t find an outer layer that avoids the… ah, I’ve heard it called ‘the uncanny valley,’ in some circles. I don’t suppose you—”

“I’ve heard of it,” Lotor told him, saving both siblings a bit of hassle.

“Right,” Tarvek sighed. “It’s an ongoing project, overall. This full-body prosthesis is among the most advanced technology on the planet right now, but my skill in microclockwork, while something I’m proud of, is something that needs to be balanced with… well, with medical treatment.”

“The best prosthesis in the world will mean _nothing_ if I die,” Anevka cheerfully added. “Also unmentioned is the fact that, while the microclockwork allows for some incredibly delicate functions, including a degree of proprioception, it’s also much easier to damage of simply… nudge out of place. If I were to, God forbid, enter a fight, I could be rather quickly incapacitated in a single solid hit, as things stand right now. It would cause enough of my cogs to crash into one another and entangle that I’d be incapable of moving near anything.”

Lotor frowned, brow furrowed rather deeply. “But why _is_ there so much in the torso? Would it not be simpler to concentrate the more delicate functions in one area and allow the rest of the body to function primarily on larger, more solidly-placed systems?”

“Ah,” Tarvek said, wincing. “Perhaps if my skills extended to such compression. Alas, I’ve not yet reached _that _level, myself.”

“Hm,” Lotor said, head tilted and eyes just slightly narrowed, considering. Honestly, they almost looked like those ‘bedroom eyes’ she’d heard the scullery maids joking about. “Perhaps some electrical assistance? It would be easier to explain if anyone were to try to badger me about…”

He trailed off, as he had every time he’d spoken about presenting Anevka as a _wife_ to his worlds.

She could understand why. A wife would be _targeted._ She’d be engaging in some degree of deception and disguise no matter what. A different role.

It rankled, a little. They hadn’t discussed it yet, but it would be irritating to be… presented as something _lesser._

Still. One does as one must and all such rot. Politics! What a nuisance.

(That wasn’t to say she didn’t enjoy it. She did, on occasion, and she was _very_ good at it when she put her mind to getting what she wanted. It was just, sometimes, very… inconvenient.)

Anevka kept her eyes fixed on the mirrors, unblinking. They worked their way through her spine, removing traces of gear gunk and dust that was no trouble until it built up to the point where she got _clogged_, and—

To the point where her prosthetic got clogged. Not her. She was not the muse body. She _wasn’t._

“Anevka, I’m going to remove your controls for the head gearage,” Tarvek told her. “You’re going to be completely immobilized for the next… twenty minutes, maybe half an hour. Orbital sockets got some ash and chemical vapor in them last week and we need to clear it out before something goes wrong.”

“Understood,” Anevka said, resigning herself to having absolutely no control until it was given back to her.

She couldn’t wrest it away. Not like she maybe could have, had it been an anesthetic and her human body. Mechanics left far, far less room for such errors.

She couldn’t breathe, of course. She couldn’t speak either, really. All she had going for her right now was the sound that reached her ears and the sight through her unmoving eyes.

And then Tarvek pulled out her eyes, and she didn’t even have that.

Quiet murmurs behind her, requests for picks and screwdrivers and cotton swabs and isopropyl. Inquiries from a mind far more ancient than either herself or her brother, quietly unraveling her new nature in a way no one had, yet. Pulling her apart at the seams, so to speak, and not with the intent to harm, or the intent to control, but the intent to—to care for her.

She was suddenly quite glad for her lack of control of her body. That realization would have caused such and _awful_ little tremor in her voice, had she been speaking. Perhaps even a flinch. Unacceptable.

They did finish, eventually, putting Anevka back together again and running the tests to ensure her joints and thoughts ran as smoothly as they could. She played along, proved her proficiency, and then, of course—

“This is the basic system form,” Lotor said, laying out a blueprint with wires and—oh, the _chips_ he was displaying! He’d referred to that as a CPU, she thought, and she wondered what it could do for her. “We can’t integrate it as quickly as I’d like, given how the system currently functions, but it shouldn’t take more than two or three… weeks? The set of seven planetary turns.”

“That’s a week,” Tarvek confirmed. He frowned down at the paper. “Would we be looking at centralized control?”

“Given the nature of the situation, I’d like to implement at least two or three levels of backup communications and power sources,” Lotor said. He sketched something out on a paper to the side, a rough copy of her body, or at least _a_ body. “The muse body's equivalent to the frontal lobe would be the primary, I think, with backups in the external occipital crest, the first thoracic vertebra, the first lumbar vertebra, and the sternum. The actual organic would only connect at the base of the skull, at the…”

“Medula,” Anevka said softly. “Where would you place the power sources?”

“Small balmera crystals aren’t too difficult to obtain,” Lotor said. He frowned at the page. “With reinforcement to the various joints and limb cores, I’d like to place a centimeter-long backup crystal in each limb, and one at four by two by two in the torso. The head is also fairly key, of course, so I’d aim for one in there at two centimeters, roughly spherical.”

Anevka nodded slowly. “You think that this would function as a long-term system? Would my body be aware enough to control it during whichever medical treatments we choose to pursue?”

He hesitated.

Blue fire, he _hesitated._

“Perhaps,” he allowed. “More likely, we would engage in a… backing-up system, so to speak. While either the organic or the mechanical system was out of commission, whether for medical treatment or maintenance, the other would be aware, and then simply update the other upon connection. I assume you would prefer to keep your mechanical system from developing an independent consciousness, yes? We could install a temporary memory system that wipes all information older than, say, three days.”

Anevka stared down at the blueprints, unseeing.

Unfeeling.

_Not_ unthinking.

Tarvek groaned, removing his pince nez and rubbing at the bridge of his nose. “If Professor Beausoleil would just _respond_ to my letters, we’d at least have something more to go off of…”

“Who?” Lotor asked.

“A teacher I had in Paris,” Tarvek said. He pressed his hand fully over his eyes now, leaning back against an empty tube, the kind meant to hold insensate, growing bodies. “He’d perfected a network of multiple quasi-mechanical bodies, all synchronized, or at least close enough to perfected that it was hard to tell when he _wasn’t_ in control. He must have had two dozen roaming Paris, all considering themselves the Professor. All thinking and working in tandem, and no sign of having split off to become an independent consciousness.”

“No sign of having split off to attempt to kill the original,” Anevka said drily, with a dash of amusement. “No need to repeat the Helsinki debacle.”

“Right, that,” Tarvek agreed wearily. “I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve written to him, asking for advice on how to advance Anevka’s systems without destroying her in the process, but he always responds to it with a statement of trade secrets.”

He lashed out, surprising even Anevka as he scattered a rack of test tubes across the floor, the set clinking as it shattered.

“And he _calls himself a professor of philosophy,” _Tarvek seethed. “It’s not like he taught the freshman introduction to the ethics of medical sparkwork, right? It’s not as though his _area of study_ is _putting someone’s needs before pride and power.”_

Anevka felt… flattered, really. It wasn’t like Tarvek to slip into a fugue voice simply in rage over her circumstances. He really _did_ care.

“Would you be willing to risk a split?” Lotor asked carefully. “Or do you believe any splitting would attempt to… ensure there is only one, so to speak.”

“Post-mortem personality drift,” Anevka said flatly. “Unless you have a manner to keep it in check, it’s a risk.”

Lotor blinked slowly at her, and then pulled out a chair and sat, digging out one of those fancy little computers he carried about, the complex programs that allowed him to do oh so many wonderful things upon the screen projection he was so fond of.

“The Alteans had a form of… memory recordings, so to speak,” Lotor muttered, swiping and clicking through his system with alacrity. “They weren’t immune to corruption, but there was a 98.46% consistency rate across a period of ten years if protected from external attacks on the code. 96.34% at a hundred years, and most of that was due to external information being fed into the system to allow it to grow as a person would, rather than erasing all information or refusing the system any chance of adjusting perceptions and analyses based on new information.”

“So the system would change and adjust, but only inasmuch as the person they were based on would have under the same circumstances?” Anevka summarized.

“Precisely,” Lotor said. “Unfortunately, I know of no surviving recordings that could be assessed for long-term intactness and such, but I do have some copies of the studies and journals that were published on the technology. Rare as a white hole, really, but I was… dedicated.”

“Could we not contact some people with experience in that… oh dear, I’ve stepped on some toes, haven’t I?”

Anevka kept her voice calm and pleasant, and acknowledged the slight spasm of Lotor’s face without admitting to how it had shaken her a little to see it.

He’d been so controlled thus far. Sure, she’d wanted to see him shaken, but there was something about this that left her… well, if she’d still been able to taste anything, she’d have said it left a sour taste in her mouth.

“The Alteans were the first of Zarkon’s victims,” Lotor said, voice stiff. “There are none still publicly living, and even my own heritage of it is an ill-kept secret. Being half-Altean, when they were the first race genocided by my father, is not something I’m prone to flaunting about an empire that hates the very memory of them.”

Crickets.

Not literally, given that they were deep in the labs, so it was really the hissing of steam and exhausts, but still. The spirit of a cricket breaking the quiet was there.

“Well, that wasn’t awkward at all,” Tarvek muttered. “Alright, so we’re limited to records, which are… you said seven thousand years by Earth’s standards, right?”

“None as old as that ‘cept Albia,” Anevka sighed. She didn’t need to sigh. She did so anyway. It was dramatic, after all, and if she couldn’t wear her blood-red jewels in the lab, she’d take her jollies where she could.

“The age is largely irrelevant,” Lotor said. “I have copies. They were never quite my focus, but I have enough information storage on my ship to carry copies of nearly everything with me. I can bring them down on my next trip and we can begin work on theory integration.”

“And the medical?” Anevka asked.

He paused, and blinked at her, and opened his mouth.

He closed it, looking troubled.

“Is there something you’d like to say, _dear?”_ Anevka asked, wielding the word like a weapon. She needed to get used to such endearments, at least for while they were on Earth, but she couldn’t deny that she held herself to such a standard mainly due to her enjoyment of the complex play of emotions that crawled across Lotor’s face every time she said it.

“I would like to seek opinions from the hospital in Mechanicsburg,” Lotor admitted.

“Absolutely not,” Anevka said immediately.

“They have a better understanding of—”

“I said _no,”_ Anevka snapped. “We’ve no need for the Baron to get word of just what is wrong with me. Just how I got the way I am. He’ll suspect Sturmhalten, and send another questor, and as good as we’ve gotten at pulling the wool over their eyes, we _cannot_ do it forever, especially if, heaven forbid, the Baron comes _in person.”_

“And what would be so wrong about that?” Lotor challenged. “What is your town hiding that you are so desperate to hide from Baron Wulfenbach. I’ve spoken with the man. I’ve read his rulings. I’ve seen how his empire runs. It’s a far sight better than most I’ve seen, and he may be a hard man, but he is by and large a _fair_ one, so what is it that you fear of him?”

“I…”

Something in her hands twitched. A gear. On repeat.

“I don’t…”

She couldn’t blink. Had her gears stopped up? She couldn’t stop staring at the wall, thinking about that horrible throne that lay several rooms beyond, the chair where Father had _strapped her down and—_

“It’s…”

So many girls had been through these walls, and she remembered almost all of them, even some from before she’d been old enough to truly understand what was going on. Every scream and plea and sob played on repeat in her mind from the day she’d taken their place, kicking and shrieking and threatening her own father’s death for _daring to do this to her and breaking her down and thinking it acceptable to put his ex-lover’s mind in the body of his daughter, her father who acted like anything **but—**_

“He can’t come here,” Anevka said, and she could feel the twitching in her hand, the fingers that begged to _squeeze around someone’s throat and rip out every last muscle and organ until her father lay screaming at her feet and begging her for his life just as she’d begged him_ and the gears that were locked in place like _muscles that had nowhere left to run and nothing left to feel in the face of the pale ladies and their grim delight at a spark that was almost strong enough, a step in the right direction towards_ her downfall and her father’s downfall and her brother’s downfall, and she was already a black mark on the family record for _failing to survive at the hands of her family, stupid, stupid, **stupid girl**_ and she couldn’t afford to deepen it or to ruin Tarvek’s chances at the throne, not when that power was maybe all that could bring her back to her title for real, not when _they already looked at her like she was nothing but the scum beneath their heels in the streets of little towns that still threw their shit out the window instead of having plumbing, not when—_

“ANEVKA!”

She stumbled back from the yell, lashing out with a hand that arced with electricity and only narrowly missed Tarvek’s nose.

His eyes flickered between her metal face and the dials on the catafalque, panic writ deep beneath the forced calm on the rest of his features.

Lotor still sat behind him, head tilted like he wasn’t quite sure what he was looking at.

(She couldn’t show emotion she hadn’t really broken in a way he could see she _hadn’t made herself look weak and—)_

“I’m fine,” she said.

“You were looping,” Tarvek said. Like a clank. Looping like a clank. Not having a panic attack. Not breaking and shattering and ­_smashing herself to pieces with the shards of her own trauma and—_

“Maybe we should take a break,” her little brother suggested, once again drawing her back to reality. “Actually, it’s almost time for dinner, right? Maybe you could change dresses.”

A way out. A way to freedom. A place to compose herself and never, ever let her supposed husband-to-be see her as the pathetic mess she’d been reduced to.

But she’d just seen him break too, hadn’t she? Just a smidgen of suppressed rage and grief about his mother’s people. A lost cultural history. The hatred of his peers for something he hadn’t chosen, all brought about by a father that cared _nothing _for him.

“My father did this to me,” Anevka said, and heard the tiny, sharp gasp that came from Tarvek’s place at her cords and cables. “And what he did is… something the Baron would not forgive, not even with the friendship they once had. I may be a victim of this horror, but I would be seen as an accomplice. So would Tarvek. We did what we did to survive, and I _hate_ our father with every fiber of my being, metal and blood and bone, all of it. I loathe him, and I look forward to the day I can dance upon his grave. But his actions reflect upon me, and while I’ve not much left to lose… Tarvek does. And if Tarvek loses, in this way in particular, so do I. We’ve plans to get out of this hell our family built, but if they are triggered too soon, and the Baron unravels it before we are ready, we will _all_ be broken by it, not just my wretched excuse for a… a _sperm donor.”_

She wished she could move. Many emotions were a pain to hide, and she didn’t mind being able to do so without effort, but to shudder with rage in this moment would be an _ecstasy_ of sensation.

Anevka so dearly wanted to kill something right now.

Lotor looked at her, measuring. Wanting, perhaps. Something.

“I don’t suppose you could simply stage an accident,” he said lightly.

She’d seen the shift in his eyes. He’d meant to say something else. He’d thought to say it. He’d _almost_ said it.

What was he _hiding from her._

“With our family being the way it is? Not particularly easy,” Tarvek said. “He’s made it this far by being very, very hard to kill.”

“So you run to space,” Lotor completed, and then shrugged. “I can’t say I disagree, considering I’ve done much the same on many occasions.”

The bloody images in Anevka’s imagination did not subside.

She needed to—needed to say something.

“You’re not going to tell anyone we’re married,” Anevka said, which was a non sequitur, to be sure, but at least something. A distraction. “Not once we’ve met with your people.”

“I trust no one,” Lotor said, amiable enough to follow her lead. Tarvek didn’t relax much, but there was a minute change to the tension in his shoulders. “So no.”

“So what shall you tell them?” She asked. “And… well, to be sure, a clank is much less suspicious than a… _companion_ of a species unencountered by your kind.”

He shrugged. “It was a factor of my decision to approach you with the offer, to be sure. Once we’ve enabled you to disengage from your catafalque without losing the informational connection, it will indeed be simpler to integrate you into my life, or at least my ship, without raising suspicions. A wife who appeared human would certainly cause questions, perhaps enough to endanger your planet, and with the resources it carries, I was loathe to risk it. A clank, as you so put it, can be explained away. Human shapes are similar enough to Altean and Galra and many others that, with your lack of particularly distinguishing accessories, in terms of ear shape and color and such, I can explain you away as simply a very, very intelligent robot. Less danger to your person, and to your people.”

“And to my planet and all the ‘quintessence’ and sparks it carries, which would not be something you want your father encountering,” Anevka said drily.

Lotor blinked slowly, eyebrows raised high, as though thinking a very blunt little _duh._

“So she can be around without causing too many questions about where she came from or what her form is based on,” Tarvek said, drawing them back on track. “But it probably isn’t a great idea to admit you got _married,_ so…”

“I’ve been thinking about it, and an assistant or secretary would be the easiest to explain away,” Lotor said. “I could justify it by saying that a sufficiently advanced system could be helpful without being as easily compromised as someone organic. Or simply that I saw something of her form and was intrigued enough to purchase a copy to see how such an assistant would work out.”

“And the advancement of the system wouldn’t raise questions as well?” Tarvek prodded.

“They’re not unheard of,” Lotor said. He screwed up his face in thought. “Not common, though, simply because the costs of production and replication are too high. Maintenance is a nightmare, and ultimately it’s not considered worth doing to add a personality. I don’t suppose you would mind being presented as a useful curiosity?”

“I would mind _very much,”_ Anevka said. “However… it could be fun, I think. To see how long we could go about tricking entire galaxies, no?”

He blinked slowly, and tilted his head. Catlike, almost. How odd. “You would be interested, but only with the caveat that it is a challenge in trickery?”

Anevka would have beamed, if she still had the capacity to do so. “Precisely! Goodness knows it would be _insulting_ to be treated as just a piece of property, only there to assist and—well, I’m limited in many ways, as a woman in a culture which does not always allow such opportunities, to the point where marriage in many areas still turns a woman into the property of her husband… but I’d prefer to avoid making that even _more_ literal than it already is.”

She slid a knife from her sleeve and started spinning it about on her fingertip, ignoring Tarvek’s near-squawk of protest at the motion. Honestly, he was so _anxious_ about these things; her gears weren’t going to catch and cause her to lose control of the knife, not when he’d _just_ cleaned them. Her dress was perfectly safe, and so were the stoppered beakers of 10M (various) <1pH arranged on the shelf beside them.

So _panicky._ It was almost cute, like he was five and trying not to lose sight of Martellus’s giant dogs again.

She made the knife stop, rolling her hand about in the air and watching the blade glint in the light as it moved with her, perfectly balanced.

“I am much like this blade,” she said. “Slight, and less impressive than a death ray, more easily hidden than that which people seek to make connections to in the fore, but I am deadly and quiet and keen on staying hidden, when it’s fun. I am… perhaps not so balanced, but I am controlled. I am cold. I am a good weapon to keep at your side, if you want something hidden and clever and poisonous to the core.”

“Metaphorically or literally?” Lotor asked, voice as dry as dust. “Because I do fear that I must warn you, the former is a problem if you mean to imply that you’d take your chances with poisoning me as a person simply for the fun of it.”

“Darling, please, you’ve been alive for longer than any on my planet save Albia. You’d survive. It would be fun! A _challenge,”_ she crooned. “Just a spot of surprise, here and there. It keeps a relationship new and exciting, no?”

“Wait, is _that_ why you tried seducing Tryggvassen that one—”

“In any case,” Anevka cut her brother off because—well, because nobody needed to hear about _that_ poor decision. “I might try poisoning, metaphorically or literally, take your pick. The point, however, is that I would not be likely to try doing so _seriously._ I’ve nothing to gain from it, after all.”

Lotor blinked slowly. Did that rather a lot, didn’t he? He looked down at the glass of pressed blackberry juice that had, at some point, made its way into his hand, and then looked back up at her. “You know, I’ve rarely thought this about anyone, but your family life and upbringing appear to have been more convoluted and ultimately unhealthy than my own. That is… a feat.”

“We’re Valois, dear. It’s the name of the game,” Anevka told him.

“We’re also the worst branch,” Tarvek said flatly. “The Von Blitzengaards are a little less likely to engage in fulminicide, and the Luzhakna branch is downright _noble.”_

“I’d say the lack of spark might be what does it,” Anevka tittered.

“Or maybe the distance from the throne,” Tarvek snapped right back.

“Oh, feisty. I rather remembered you being taught to respect your elders, little brother.”

“I _built_ you. I get sarcasm rights.”

“Hmph,” Anevka huffed, tossing her head in a way that almost dislodged the wig affixed to her metal skull.

Ugh.

She kept _forgetting._

Lotor stood swiftly, glass sitting on the table, and strode over to her. He tucked one arm behind himself, and bowed slightly to offer her the other.

Anevka wanted to quirk an eyebrow. She settled for tilting her head and letting her eyes close just slightly in question.

“We’ve a need to make this marriage at least someone realistic, no?” Lotor asked. “Everyone will know it’s a political arrangement, but appearances are, if not everything, then quite a bit of it.”

“My, are you asking me to join you on a date?” She snapped out her fan and fluttered it afore her face. “How forward of you.”

Oh, he was _so_ close to rolling his eyes. She just had to try a little harder.

“I’m afraid I may have already crossed that line when I suggested a marriage before a proper outing as a couple,” he said. She liked this.

She wanted to keep him. Not even in a jar of formaldehyde, like when she’d gotten a crush as a child.

“Well, I suppose I’ll take you up on that,” she sighed, taking his hand and allowing him to at least pretend he was pulling her titanium body to its feet.

He offered her his arm.

She took it.

They were off.

Behind them, Tarvek dropped his head into his hands, and Anevka could faintly hear him groaning. “Why did I think this was a good idea…”

Adorable.


	3. There's a Wedding to Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Building a rapport, planning a wedding, breaking down like hell...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for a minor breakdown mid-chapter that involves destruction of personal property due to anger (toxic but not abusive, Sturmhalten is just a shitty situation all around), and as usual, many references to Anevka's traumatic backstory and the rest of the hell that is that town.

Anevka took Lotor to little shops around Sturmhalten, cafes and bookstores and millineries. She advised him of the history of the cathedral and the oldest bridge, and let him ‘help’ her up large step when her skirts got in the way. She made very, very sure that everyone saw them.

There were a few Wulfenbach soldiers that caught sight of them, and erupted into furtive whispers. Good. The news would be to the Baron by the morning, and all over Europa by the end of the week.

No need for an escort or chaperone, of course; they were in _public,_ and she had her strongboys carrying the catafalque. All very proper, as expected of a young woman of her high breeding.

“I don’t see why there are so many hat shops,” he commented, when Anevka decided that perhaps she _didn’t_ need a new purchase from the millinery today, but maybe _Lotor_ deserved to find something suitable. “I’ve seen at least three.”

“Tradition, protection from the sun, fashion,” Anevka listed off. “Mechanicsburg’s been coming back into vogue, and they take their hats more seriously than any on the continent, so everyone’s looking to that, right now.”

“Tradition?” he questioned.

“Well, a religious standard that becomes a habit of centuries is tradition, yes?” Anevka asked. “Many cultures, particularly the Abrahamic religions, ask that the followers cover their heads, at minimum when in houses of worship. Back when religion was half of the state, that meant that many of those rules were enforced. Many patches of Europa still consider it improper to be seen without some form of head covering.”

“I… see.”

“Especially for women.”

He glanced at her sidelong, and Anevka would have smiled innocently, had she had the capability.

“I see.”

“And you do need to take it off indoors, in most situations. It’s only polite.”

“I can’t remember the last time I wore a hat from anything other than protection from the sun,” Lotor said, voice dry. “Unless my helmet counts.”

“It doesn’t, and that’s also for protection.”

“Oh no,” he said. “You caught me.”

Anevka stopped and turned, fan snapping closed and thumping him lightly on the chest with it. “Don’t be rude, darling.”

He looked down at the fan that had come to a stop against his chest, and then looked back up at her. He held up one finger and lightly pushed it out of the way.

“Dramatic,” she accused.

“By this world’s standards? Hardly.”

Anevka sighed, voice grate almost whistling—she’d have to remember that, it was _terribly_ inconvenient—and turned again. “You’re no fun.”

“I would take that as a compliment, except I’m rather certain you’re lying.”

“I might not be,” Anevka said lightly. “You haven’t even joined me for a dissection yet, after all.”

“Of course,” Lotor said. “How rude of me.”

“Terribly so.”

He raised an eyebrow at her, a silent reminder that their conversation had reached the point of nonsense, and she made her decision.

Her hand wrapped around his wrist like a vise, and she turned on her heel.

“We’re getting you a hat,” she declared.

“Don’t I get a say in whether I get a hat?”

“Not in my town, dear.”

Well, he didn’t seem upset by this. Mostly amused. A little confused. Ultimately bemused.

How quaint.

How _fun._

\--

“You’re getting along with that extraterrestrial prince,” her father commented one dinner.

Anevka didn’t stiffen. She couldn’t, really, and even if she’d been capable of it, she wasn’t moving enough for a sudden pause to be noticeable—family dinners didn’t include actually _eating_ anything, for her.

Tarvek didn’t stiffen either. Mostly. _She_ noticed it, but only because she was paying attention.

“He’s clever,” Anevka said, because Father was clearly leading somewhere with this. “And he presents a… unique opportunity.”

A look indicating she should go on.

She shrugged delicately. “I’m unlikely to marry among the Fifty Families now, while he fears the danger of a wife that appears to be of a new and unknown species. This way, we both win: he gets his ties to Earth solidified in a way the Families respect, and I get to see more of the universe than any human ever has.”

“And a husband,” Father pointed out.

“Largely irrelevant,” Anevka said. “What use do I have for one?”

Tarvek made a noise of mild disgust. Anevka threw her knife at him without looking, and he caught it between two fingers.

“You’re going to damage the mahogany,” he whined. Oh, he’d deny it if she said anything, but a whine it was.

“So?”

“What does Terabithia think?” Father interrupted the blossoming argument.

Anevka paused for a fraction of a moment, trying to figure out just what answer Father wanted to hear. He’d never gotten along with his mother-in-law, much as his children—as all in their generation, really—looked up to the woman.

“I think she approves,” Tarvek said. “She was despairing of getting Anevka married off any time soon, after… the accident. A unique opportunity, like ‘Nevka said.”

Anevka inclined her head, a silent thanks that looked to her father like a bland agreement. “It’s true; I doubt anyone else would have me. I can’t exactly perform my wifely duties in my state, can I?”

“Anevka!” Tarvek yelped, nearly spilling soup on himself. “During dinner? Really?”

“Tarvek,” she said, tone as mocking as she could make it. She turned back to Aaronev. “After all, who of us yet knows how his species functions? I certainly don’t think I have to worry with him that he expects anything of me, certainly not when I can’t imagine he’s cared to test his body to any other woman here.”

“You can’t?” Aaronev prodded.

Anevka tilted her head. “Oh no, I really can’t. He’s far too _rigid_ to dally about like that, I think.”

She didn’t know, actually, but she couldn’t begrudge Lotor if he _had_ decided to experiment. She also had no interest in telling Aaronev more of the truth than she absolutely had to.

After all, he hadn’t cared much for telling _her_ the truth before he’d ripped her from any chance of real happiness, had he?

\--

A three-dimensional graph. Holographic. Four dimensional, really, given how a timing factor could be added.

How _delightful._

“So is it primarily electromagnetic?” Tarvek asked.

“Not primarily, but that’s the easiest to measure,” Lotor said. “Quintessence can glow, if it’s powerful enough, so it is the… quick and dirty way, so to speak.”

“Speak more,” Anevka goaded.

Tarvek rolled his eyes.

Lotor didn’t seem perturbed. “This particular graph… the x axis is the frequency, the z axis is the stability, and the y axis is the intensity.”

“Electromagnetic waves aren’t any more or less intense themselves, though,” Tarvek pointed out. “There’s simply more or less of them.”

“Yes, that’s generally what we measure,” Lotor admitted.

“And what do you mean by stability?” Anevka prodded.

Lotor made a face. “Let’s see… your culture often uses frequency modulation as a way of carrying information, correct?”

“We’re working on it,” Tarvek said.

“I wouldn’t call it often,” Anevka added.

“Hm.” Lotor shook his head. “Nonetheless, you know what I mean. There are minute shifts in the frequency that I believe occur due to something similar to what you refer to as a Doppler Effect on a quantum level, as the energy is… just energy, not storage of it, so it appears to shift just in and out of our dimension on occasion.”

“Like if a pendulum had a speaker attached to it,” Tarvek summarized.

“But much, much quicker and smaller,” Lotor said.

“Does it present the same way here?” Anevka asked. “You said our planet was a twinned space, so we’re already dimensionally strange, aren’t we?”

He smiled at her.

Fangs and clever eyes and a small, _knowing_ smile that didn’t come across as manipulative or trying too hard or not trying hard enough.

(Oh, he was _good._ She’d almost felt something that time.)

“Precisely what I was thinking,” Lotor said. “And what I’m finding is that there usually seem to be two sets of quintessence signatures, depending on the angle of analysis, one much weaker than the other. I think that locations of high quintessence on this planet are part of how this system maintains stability as a twinned space, whether as anchors to where the dimensions are closest, or anchors to hold them apart. I’ll have to do more research, of course, but—”

“But it’s a start,” Anevka finished for him.

“I’ve also been taking readings of living and sapient creatures and clanks when I can convince them to let me,” Lotor continued, standing up and coming closer, eyes bright. “I wasn’t surprised to find that Sparks have higher quintessence levels on the average, or the Jägerkin, but I’ve found several clanks with sapient-level quintessence despite no apparent means of _storing_ said energy, or of creating it as many living creatures do.”

“Tinka?” She asked, taking his hands in hers.

“Higher than any save that broken Castle in Mechanicsburg,” Lotor immediately said. “Whoever crafted her and those sisters you’ve told me about was a master.”

“So the Muses _are_ alive by some standards, not simply mimicking emotion on a program,” Anevka whispered. “And myself?”

“I’ve not yet measured.”

“Oh?”

“I would need your permission, of course,” Lotor said. “And I’ve yet to ask it of you, given that such readings may lead to something of a hectic night once we have them.”

“There’s time on the clock, darling.”

“Then perhaps you would like to begin?”

A cough interrupted them. “You know I’m still here, yes?”

Anevka turned to glare at her brother. “We were having a moment.”

“A moment where you were forgetting I was here and, somewhat importantly, the person who actually _knows_ how your systems work and can provide information on what the information you gather might mean,” Tarvek said, voice dry.

“We hadn’t _forgotten,”_ Anevka snapped, and felt Lotor pull his hands from hers, as if he’d only just realized what he’d done. “But there was a _moment._ And I’d rather build something of a rapport with my future husband.”

Tarvek rolled his eyes, the little _brat._

Anevka turned on her heel and didn’t mention that part of why she was so upset was that she’d heard Lotor’s voice building and changing and almost—_almost—_sounding like he was on the verge of a true fugue.

So close.

Impossible, but it was happening, and she wanted to watch him fugue.

To fugue _with him._

To dance about the madness place as easily as they’d danced across the ballroom, months ago.

So, so, _so close._

And the man didn’t even know it, did he?

\--

“You know, I find this almost absurd,” Lotor said. “I understand it—don’t give me that look—but it’s not something I’ve encountered, elsewhere.”

“You’re _royalty,”_ Tarvek said, with a disbelief bordering on disgust. “And you’ve never bothered with writing up a thorough engagement contract?”

“Prenuptial arrangements can make or break a marriage here,” Anevka quipped. She draped herself over the back of Lotor’s chair. She held her head still next to his, and she was delighted to find he didn’t seem keen on getting away from her at _all._

“Most high ranks in the Galra Empire are military, not nobility; such contracts serve little purpose in our culture. As for other planets and peoples… I can’t say I’ve been invited to many weddings, myself. Or had casual acquaintances I could interrogate about such practices. The few times I was on good terms, they were usually planets that were being assimilated into Galra culture.”

“How _drab,”_ Anevka cooed. “And the Alteans?”

“Only had one royal family, and I haven’t found records of cultural practices like marriage.”

“Unfortunate,” Tarvek said tersely—he was eyeing her with irritation, cute—and tapped a pen on the desk, “But we still have to do it, and for some reason, Farther put me in charge of mediating for the two of you. I don’t know _why,_ since Anevka’s more than capable of making her own decisions, and Father himself would be—”

“He doesn’t like spending too much time in the same room as me, and my legal ability to make such decisions is in question due to my medical status,” Anevka interrupted her brother with false cheer. “And you’re the male heir, so _clearly…”_

Tarvek rolled his eyes. “Still.”

“Just write the contract, little brother,” Anevka urged. “Or you’ll find yourself strangled in your sleep tonight.”

“Empty threats are so _crude,_ Anevka,” Tarvek snipped. “You’re not a _tavern brawler._ Have a little dignity.”

She pulled a knife, and Lotor pushed her hand down without even the slightest hesitation.

Anevka turned her head just enough to side-eye him.

“I’d really rather not waste time,” he said. “Which, yes, a stabbing counts as wasting time.”

“I wouldn’t _stab_ him, not _really._ Just a _light_ stabbing. A poke. Maybe a slice or two.”

“You’re not convincing me.”

“Are you done?” Tarvek demanded. “Really. Are you quite finished?”

“You’re ruining the fun, little brother.”

“The fun of you explaining how you want to hurt me? I’ll survive.”

“Will you?” Lotor asked, his voice so even Anevka could have almost pretended to believe he wasn’t just poking fun.

Tarvek covered is face with both hands. He stayed that way for several seconds, barely moving but to breathe.

Drama queen.

He dragged his hands down his face, with a sigh that threatened to become a groan.

“Can we _please_ just get this contract written up?” He begged. “Then you two can go off and do—quite frankly I don’t know what it is that you’re going to do, but you’re getting along and that scares me rather a lot, so I’d prefer _not_ to know, but you can do what you do far away from me.”

“Are all siblings like this?” Lotor asked, voice innocent and mild and curious and _so _very provocative.

(In that it provoked response, of course, not in the sense of erotic nature.)

(She’d maybe ask him to try that later. He certainly had the foundations for it, but the experience… she’d need to learn more about his possible past exploits, there.)

“No,” Tarvek said. “But enough. Many. I don’t care and I don’t know, can we _please_ get back on track.”

“Of course,” Anevka said, as if there’d never been any suggestion otherwise. She slipped into her seat, and she wondered if Lotor was disappointed or relieved. She wasn’t sure which she hoped for. “What’s first?”

“I hate you,” Tarvek informed her. He pulled out a pen anyway.

\--

Lotor kissed her hand when he left the next day, and Anevka tittered as a young lady was expected to. He smirked, and boarded an airship to continue some of his collaborations with other powerful sparks and large institutions. She watched the airship leave, sure that her face was displaying the same faint smile as always. She spun on her heel, and rode her extended carriage back up to the castle, and thanked the stars above that she didn’t have to work to keep her face politely, pleasantly neutral for the world around her.

And Tarvek. She thanked Tarvek.

(Not to his _face,_ of course…)

That said, she did hunt down her darling little brother as soon as she entered her wretched home, and ignored the spike of panic on his face as she approached in a way that would have been described as ‘looming’ if not for the fact that he was taller than her.

She took his wrist and pulled him close and hissed, “we need to talk.”

He pulled back, eyes searching her face for something he _wasn’t going to find,_ and pursed his lips. He nodded. “Let’s get on with it, then.”

Anevka didn’t loosen her grip on his wrist as she dragged him to the nearest secure rooms, and he didn’t ask her to.

She eyed the strongboys just barely long enough to decide that, wasped as they were, she couldn’t trust them.

“Set me down. Wait outside the door.”

They exchanged nervous glances of their own, but did so.

Tarvek watched them leave, then turned to Anevka and crossed his arms. “What’s happened?”

“He’s too clever by half,” Anevka said. “I do like him, but that’s immaterial: we’re in too deep to pull back, and we _can’t_ take him out of commission. Wasping won’t work and the Baron will investigate in a heartbeat if we kill him.”

Tarvek leaned back against a bookcase and watched her pace the room as far as her cables would allow. “You think he’ll figure it out?”

“It’s a risk.”

“One we’ve dealt with before. We’ve had questors come through.”

“He’s not a questor. He’s a _guest.”_

“So he isn’t trained in how to detect a supporter of the Lady.”

“Listen to yourself,” Anevka snapped.

Tarvek raised his hands. “Sorry, you’re right. The Baron might have told him what to look for, and you’re right that he’s clever enough.”

“It’s not just that,” Anevka griped. “We _do_ get along. Well enough that he’ll likely try to get the secrets out, because he—he thinks he _cares_ or something.”

“Because of sentiment,” Tarvek summarized for her.

She wanted to rip the stupid glasses off his face and crush them because _yes,_ it was _fucking sentiment._

“You think he won’t leave well enough alone if you just, you know, _tell_ him that you’re uncomfortable discussing it?” Tarvek asked. “Or a half-truth? He already knows father was involved. That’s probably enough to get him to back off if he actually cares the way you think he does.”

“He doesn’t,” Anevka said immediately. “We know each other, but only barely. He cares because he has the heart of some hero or some similar nonsense. I’m the damsel, remember?”

“We both know that’s not true.”

She hissed at him, a crackle of noise from the grate of her puppet’s throat. “That’s what they _all_ view me as!”

“He knows as well as I do how easy it would be for you to kill someone,” Tarvek said, voice far more even than he let anyone else see. His gaze was cool, like he knew her better than she knew herself. “Nobody is under any illusions there. He doesn’t want to _save_ you. He just knows you provide some avenues of advancement that other options don’t, and he’s smart enough to recognize that you could be a massive help.”

“He wants to save an entire intergalactic empire, Tarvek,” Anevka snapped. “Of course he wants to save the poor, pathetic little—”

“Monster?” He asked.

She threw a vase at his head.

It went wide enough that he didn’t even flinch as it shattered against the bookshelf, just raised an eyebrow at her.

Anevka’s aim was better than that, and they both knew it.

She wasn’t angry at _him._

“You can be, you know,” Tarvek said. “You will be, if you want. The second we get the remote control system integrated, you can go out and be the monster you want to be.”

“How reassuring.”

Tarvek closed his eyes, and shook his head, and suddenly looked so very, very tired. “Can we please not do this?”

“Do what?”

_“Anevka,”_ he said, eyes opening. He pleaded. Just her name, and he was begging her to stop.

She wanted to break something.

Was that _pity_ in his eyes?

“Do you need me to increase the painkillers again?”

“Shut up.”

He did.

She paced again, doing her best to get rid of the frenetic energy that filled her from top to bottom, rage and manic power that she had nowhere to _put_ because the target was her father and the situation had her trapped in a web of intrigue and mind control and utterly impossible standards.

“Maybe we should just tell the Baron,” she said, before she could stop herself.

Tarvek shook his head. A tiny movement. Eyes already closed again. “You know we can’t.”

“And why not?”

“Anevka, you _know_ what he’ll do.”

“Do you know how many girls went in that blasted machine before—”

“Do you want to be _decommissioned?” _Tarvek demanded. “Do you want to be thrown into prison for aiding and abetting? Do you want us both to end up in Castle Heterodyne, or somewhere _worse?_ You’ve heard what happened to Vapnoople!”

“He’ll be lenient, if we feed him information,” Anevka said. “We can end it, we can take Sturmhalten and—”

“And the Geisterdamen will slit our throats,” Tarvek said, raising his voice as loud as he dared, even with the privacy the room afforded them. “Or they’ll command the townspeople to do it. Or they’ll tell your strongboys to pull your cables and smash your tubing. They’ll kill us before we can survive to see them ended. If the Baron doesn’t imprison us, it will be only because the Mistress’s priestesses _killed us first.”_

“We are of the Smoke,” Anevka said. “We can survive.”

“Can we?” Tarvek asked. “Against the weissdamen? You’ve seen how they move, and it’s a hell of a lot faster than your strongboys.”

“The—the wedding, then. It’s all going to come to a head there anyway, we’ll step aside with the Baron, or—or we could ask Lotor to fly us up and then send a message. We’d be safe in that ship.”

“And if they left more sleeper agents?” Tarvek asked. “If they—”

** _You will not tell the Baron._ **

If Anevka yet breathed, her breath would have caught in her throat.

** _The time has not yet come for him to know._ **

Blue fire, not _them._

“You knew?” Tarvek asked, eyes fixed on the impossible creature stood in the center of the room.

Where had it _come from?_

** _The Baron is not to know. It will rip this universe to shreds if he is to learn too soon._ **

Anevka closed her eyes.

“So can we blame you if he asks us why we never told him what was going on?” Tarvek asked.

Smart boy.

** _It matters not._ **

Anevka waited, gears locked in as close a sensation as she still had to having her heart lodged in her throat.

Nothing.

She opened her eyes, and the Dreen was gone.

Tarvek met her eyes, and the terror was just as clear there as it was in her own mind.

“We won’t—”

“We won’t tell the Baron.”

He nodded. “You’ll work around Lotor.”

“Whatever it takes.”

The decision was no longer hers to make.

_Oh, St. Theodora save us…_

\--

Lotor didn’t stay away for long, of course.

They had a wedding to plan, and a system to upgrade.

Lots to do.

\--

“Ma-a-ster?”

Not again.

“Tinka? What are you doing up?”

“Wou.ou.ou.ould you care to see me _danCE?”_

_Make it stop._

Lotor touched Anevka’s elbow. “Is this… normal?”

“She’s usually not well enough to stand,” Anevka said, voice low. “You’re lucky—you’ve seen her active twice already.”

Tinka crashed into a wall, eyes unfocused, and Tarvek fluttered about her, trying to find a way to help.

(Sometimes Anevka wondered if it might be better to just put the poor clank out of her misery.)

(But they’d said that about Anevka, hadn’t they? And it made her feel better, sometimes, to know there was someone suffering nearly as much as she was… or even more…)

(She was a monster. She’d never denied it, and likely never would.)

“Perhaps I could… help?” Lotor said, careful and hesitant. “If nothing else, another set of eyes couldn’t hurt, and it could provide some additional context for how we adjust your systems.”

Anevka shrugged. “Talk to my brother; she is his project, so to speak.”

It was mostly true. Tinka was Tarvek’s to inherit by right of blood, and he’d been the one to take on the task of undoing the damage their father had done.

“You don’t mind?” Lotor asked.

“Why would I?” Anevka asked, voice light. “Go ahead. Do as you will, or at least as far as my darling baby brother will allow you.”

Lotor eyed her for another moment, and then ducked his head. “Of course.”

She watched him leave, and her palms itched with a desire to dig into that long hair, to grab fistfuls by the roots and pull the man to his knees.

She turned back to the table and busied herself with reading more of Lotor’s translated texts on quintessence.

Her hindbrain hummed, trying to build up the energy to get into the hyperfocused fugue of a good research binge. As usual, nothing came of it, but she rode what little of the wave there was. It certainly helped her pay attention to what she was reading instead of trying to listen in on the boys.

Anevka snapped out of the haze of reading as she processed the raised voices behind her, and turned. The strongboys were nervous, eyes darting between her and the two at the table with Tinka.

Tarvek was in one of his careful fugues, the ones where he knew exactly what he was doing and had the harmonics of the madness place, but hadn’t quite lost himself as so many did. Lotor was—

Damn him, the man was _so close._ What an utter waste of such a brilliant brain to have no Spark.

Anevka got to her feet and drifted closer, and found the two of them bent low over the back of Tinka’s opened head, arguing over the meaning of a connection and the nature of a certain gear or glowing line.

“—ing is that the _quintessence_ is wrong!”

“If it’s wrong, then explain _how._ I don’t know this field, Lotor, you’ll have to _show me things. _Charts and diagrams and numbers and graphs. I need to know what’s wrong before I can suggest ways to fix it!”

Anevka leaned past them and put her face inches from Tinka’s. “Hello.”

Tinka didn’t respond.

Hm. Unfortunate.

“You’re in good hands,” she said, patting Tinka’s shoulder. _“Isn’t she,_ boys?”

Lotor and Tarvek had near-identical expressions of dreading anticipation on their frozen faces, and Anevka chuckled. “You’ll be fine, dear. After all, I need you as a bridesmaid.”

“Wait, what?” Tarvek demanded.

“Yes,” Anevka said. “I’ve decided. I’d like Tinka as a bridesmaid.”

“Anevka, she can barely walk, you can’t just—”

“So fix her.”

“I’ve been trying to do that for over a year!”

“Try harder.”

“It’s the quintessence,” Lotor muttered, and Anevka had the delightful experience of seeing her brother’s face turn almost as red as his hair.

“Also Seffie and Violetta, I think; they’ll like the chance to dress up,” she mused. “Maybe we’ll bring Zulenna down from Castle Wulfenbach and make it a family reunion.”

“No friends?” Lotor asked. “I was under the impression—”

“I don’t have many friends that didn’t abandon me after the accident,” Anevka said, forcing her voice as cheerful as she could. “It happens. Family sticks around a little longer… sometimes.”

Lotor blinked at her. His eyes drifted past and—“Will your assistants be given a uniform for the special event?”

“I should _think_ so!”

“And… the catafalque?”

“We’ll decorate it if you don’t have the remote integration system set up by then,” Anevka dismissed. _“Do_ try to make it so we can at least keep my waking coffin off the… hm.”

“I don’t like that ‘hm,’” Tarvek said almost immediately.

“Of course you don’t,” Anevka said, utterly unaffected. “But really, we haven’t decided where we’ll marry, or who we’ll have officiate…”

“The Pope of the Mountains?” Tarvek suggested.

“No, we won’t be able to invite half of Italia if we do that,” Anevka said.

“The Corbettites, then, we have an uncle—” Tarvek continued.

“Absolutely not, I hate that man.”

“Must it be a religious figure?” Lotor asked. “I was under the impression that a head of state would suffice.”

“Tradition dictates it must be _a_ Pope, or at least a Cardinal,” Tarvek told him.

Lotor shrugged. “Or you could curry favor and ask the Baron to officiate.”

Anevka stared at him. So did Tarvek.

Lotor looked at them through half-lidded eyes, like they were missing something obvious. “I have no ties to your religions. I _do _have ties to your governments. I respect the Baron, and having his explicit approval of the marriage in such a fashion would reflect well on the mutual aid we are attempting to project with the union.”

The Sturmvoraus siblings exchanged a look.

“It’s unprecedented,” Tarvek said hesitantly. “And it suggests we submit to his power…”

“With what I have at my disposal?” Lotor asked. “And you are already subjects of his by definition.”

“Would he even agree to it?” Anevka asked.

“Does it hurt to ask?” Lotor shot back.

Well… no.

No, it didn’t.

“We’ll have to find a neutral place to ask him,” Tarvek decided. “Not aboard his castle, and not inside ours.”

“There’s always Paris,” Anevka said.

Tarvek grimaced. “We’ll figure something out. Lotor, I’m guessing you know how to broach the subject to get him to meet with us for a question like that without actually giving away what it is that we need to ask?”

Lotor snorted. “Do you take me for a fool? Of course I do.”

“Great!” Anevka said, clapping her hands. “Now let’s get back to the more immediate problems of fixing Tinka and separating me from the catafalque. Chop chop!”

“You were the one that paused us in the first place,” Tarvek pointed out.

Anevka would have rolled her eyes, if she could. “I’ll help this time, dear, don’t you worry.”

And if she let her arm brush against Lotor’s a little more than was strictly necessary… well, what of it?


	4. If You Don't Hate Me Yet, You Will

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tarvek: have you considered maybe he actually likes you  
Anevka: absolutely the fuck not and also how dare you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for: autopsy details, the usual Anevka stuff with regards to her current state of being and hatred of Aaronev (I'm starting to wonder if I even SHOULD warn for that anymore, it's basically everywhere, all the time), and now also some mentions of Lotor's own issues regarding Honerva. A number of sex jokes, some of which cause the audience discomfort.
> 
> Also we get into the grey area of some often-misused tropes regarding things like disability, in this case: attraction. While I hope most of this is evident within the text, I'd like to address it more clearly here.  
Anevka has difficulty viewing herself as attractive, and due to trust issues born of her familial traumas, she is unable to see someone expressing attraction to her in her current state as being genuine. The idea that it is a 'sacrifice' or 'exceptional' to be attracted to a disabled person is one that is parroted often in various medias, and my hopes here are that I've engaged sufficiently with Anevka's mental state and emotional damage that it's a clear factor of her traumas and not an actual reflection of my views as the author. She is not a reliable narrator (as evidenced most clearly by her thoughts on Tarvek's affection for her being obligatory instead of genuine), and commentary regarding her hatred for her current state is to be taken with a grain of salt.
> 
> Finally, the reason for Anevka saying sex is off the table completely and not just "who would want me anyway" is that the painkillers deaden her senses too much to feel anything anyway. This is, again, stated in the text, but something I wanted to clarify.

_He spoke with the Baron. The Sturmvoraus siblings had eventually decided it was best for him to do so alone, and their father’s disinterest had served him well in the entire endeavor of marrying the clockwork princess. There had been the hurdle of speaking with the maternal grandparents, and the dowager princess Terabithia was very critical of Lotor’s entire personage, interrogating him in a way he wouldn’t have allowed of anyone if not for the fact that, if he wanted this plan to work at all, he had to play nice._

_(A small part of Lotor’s mind actually bothered to acknowledge that he’d grown fond of Anevka, despite her callous disregard for… well, many things he’d have considered if he’d gone out _looking_ for a wife instead of finding the situation he had. She wasn’t the kind of person he’d have necessarily gravitated towards, but he could more than admit that they clicked in a way he hoped spoke well of future partnerships.)_

_The Baron eyed him and asked, in a voice quite low, if Lotor knew of that family’s reputation._

_Lotor said that he did, but that he had something Anevka wanted and even needed, and so he didn’t expect any betrayals._

_“So you aren’t marrying for love.”_

_It was not a question._

_“We are royalty, and I find myself growing fond of her, but the marriage is a strategic one. Her medical situation is rare, if not unique, and I have the resources to further her treatments,” Lotor said. “And while I cannot overstate the importance of your planet in my attempts to stop my father’s path of imperialism, I also cannot overstay my welcome. People are already beginning to get antsy.”_

_“And you imagine a wife of a local royal line would tide them over.”_

_“A reason to visit, and political connections to use,” Lotor said. He shrugged. “We will be going through with it no matter your opinion, but we felt it would be useful to all parties to have you perform the ceremony.”_

_“I see,” the Baron said. “While I would normally refrain from asking such a question, as I strive to promote an egalitarian society in the lands under my control, I also must note that things are a little more complex when it comes to royalty, especially as you are doing this for politics, not love: have you gained the family’s permission?”_

_“Her father seems not to care,” Lotor said, and did not show how much that rankled; it was useful, and that mattered more than those thoughts he’d seen flickering across Tarvek’s face, and the imagined mirror of those emotions on Anevka’s unmoving mien. “Her brother was party to the original negotiations. I spoke with the maternal grandparents. All is as it should be, to the best of my knowledge; none of have as of yet told me that my courtship of their princess is a problem to be solved, addressed, or terminated.”_

_The Baron eyed him for a long moment, face still shuttered beyond the ever-present scowl._

_“It is traditional to have a member of the Church perform such ceremonies,” the Baron said carefully. “As I’m sure you’ve been made aware.”_

_“I have no connections to your religions, nor do I desire them,” Lotor said, allowing a small smirk to play across his face. “I am sure they have their uses, but strengthening ties to the Pax Wulfenbachia and the Fifty Families will serve me somewhat better, I imagine.”_

_The Baron closed his eyes and shook his head. He sighed, and muttered something that sounded very much like ‘children.’ Lotor tried not to be offended by that; he was some hundred and fifty times the age of the man before him. Just because his physical development had halted somewhere in early-to-mid adulthood didn’t erase the literal millennia behind him._

_“Where do you propose to have the ceremony?” the Baron asked, leaning forward across the desk and bracing himself on it. For a moment, Lotor was reminded that this man was just as tall as he was and—despite Lotor’s Altean and Galran heritage granting him superior physical power to most—twice as strong._

_“We’ve not yet decided,” Lotor told him._

_“Hm. Do so soon,” the Baron said. “I’ll agree to the plan, but I require details ahead of time. There will need to be guards, and if I am to play a role in your ceremony and aid in the protection of this planet, then it would be best that I have time to prepare some section of my troops to put on a show, as it were.”_

_Lotor inclined his head. “My thanks. We will send word when such decisions are made, Herr Baron.”_

_“See that you do,” the Baron said. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have a countess to meet with about her refusal to address tax distribution as stipulated by the contract she signed upon gaining the protection of the empire’s army.”_

_Lotor let a little smirk cross his face. “I’ll leave you to it.”_

\--

Anevka had fun with many things, but the most recent event to gain a spot amongst the little things in life was the fact that she could torture her brother by making him redesign her wedding dress time and time and time again.

He caught on quick, of course, but he was also entirely unable to help himself when it came to doing more designs.

It was almost cute.

Of course, nothing _truly_ granted Anevka this pleasure like Tarvek’s soul-deep horror at Lotor’s words.

“What do you _mean_ you’re going to wear your uniform?”

“I was under the impression that a military dress uniform was appropriate for a wedding,” Lotor said, bemused. “Was this incorrect?”

“You’re royalty, so the rules are different,” Tarvek told him. “That applies when the person getting married has a rank in the military that is higher than that of their inherited titles. Second of all—”

He turned red, and Anevka leaned forward to see if any of the capillaries burst with the force of his rage.

“You have been wearing the same outfit for _ten thousand years!”_

Lotor leaned back a little.

Anevka snapped her fan open and held it over her face.

It wasn’t to hide her smile, for her expression never changed.

It was to imply that, if she _had_ been capable of smiling, she would have been doing so, and was intended as a loving slap to the face to the dignity of both men in front of her.

“I’ve commissioned replacements on the regular,” Lotor said. He sounded hurt. Defensive.

Adorable.

“Has it been the same design?” Tarvek challenged.

“No.”

“Were the changes in the chemical makeup in the material or the actual appearance?”

“…the material.”

Tarvek was about to _throw_ something, Anevka was sure of it. She’d clap if he did.

“I am making. A suit.” Tarvek said the words carefully, like he wasn’t about to try to strangle Anevka’s future husband with his bare hands. “And you will wear it. And you will _like_ it. And if anyone asks why you are wearing it, you will say that it is to honor your bride’s culture, and because none of the clothing you brought with you is acceptable for a wedding, and your daily military uniform is a battle uniform, not a dress uniform. I will let you make some choices in the design and motif, but if you do not accept wearing a _proper suit_ to your own damn wedding, _to my sister,_ I will set you on fire.”

Lotor stared at Tarvek like he’d grown a second head.

“I agree with Tarvek,” Anevka threw in, wondering if this would settle things or stir the pot further. “If you’ve been wearing the same armor for ten thousand years, it is not acceptable for the wedding.”

She paused, closed her fan, and tapped it to her cheek as thoughtfully as she could, turning her eyes to the ceiling just for the effect. “Or the wedding night.”

_“Anevka!”_ Tarvek shrieked.

She laughed at him.

“The… wedding night?” Lotor asked. He sounded very lost.

Ah.

Had no one explained?

“It doesn’t apply to our situation,” Anevka assured him. “My body will not be up to the task, I’m afraid.”

Lotor looked from her to Tarvek.

Tarvek put a hand to his face and groaned. Ha.

“The wedding night,” Tarvek said. “Is traditionally the first time a couple is to interact… in a Biblical manner.”

“…what is ‘Biblical?’”

Anevka snickered. Tarvek looked at the ceiling. He appeared to be mourning the loss of his sanity. “The Bible is a religious text. To know someone in a Biblical manner is slang for having carnal relations.”

Anevka took pity on the both of them. “Sexual intercourse.”

Oh, so _that_ was what Lotor looked like when he blushed! She’d have to see if she could pull it from him again.

She walked over and tapped him on the chest with her fan. “We can talk about it once the medical procedures have taken effect enough for it to be worth the trouble.”

Tarvek swore, hand pressed to his face. The swearing was mostly in Russian. Anevka wondered if he was trying to hide the extent of his soul-deep despair from Lotor.

“I see,” Lotor finally managed to say. “I suppose… yes.”

“Oh, it’s quite alright if you don’t find it to your taste,” Anevka assured him. “Many don’t, and our marriage is not for love, after all. I’ll be able to handle myself quite thoroughly once I can come off the painkillers enough to feel _other_ things as well, should we find ourselves preferring to keep to separate beds once such a thing is even on the table.”

“…quite,” Lotor said, voice faint. “I…”

“Can you _please_ not have this conversation with me in the room?” Tarvek begged. “I don’t want to hear about Anevka’s future sex life.”

“Future _hypothetical_ sex life,” Anevka corrected.

_“I don’t care!”_ Tarvek whined. He wouldn’t have described it as such, of course; he had _something_ of a reputation behind that carefully constructed, entirely foppish façade, but she knew him far too well after all these years. It was a whine.

“I would also be happy to stop talking about this,” Lotor said. “Perhaps a later discussion. In private. After I’ve had some time to… research the basic anatomy and such.”

“I’ve _plenty_ of books you could—”

“Anevka,” Tarvek snapped.

She paused, and looked at him.

“Nobody is comfortable,” he said. “And it’s not in a funny way.”

Well.

Fine then.

\--

Lotor made the proposal very public. Anevka was only distantly involved in the planning for it; she picked her dress and advised on a good location for the gossip to spread as far and as quickly as possible, and then let Lotor pick Tarvek’s brain for the rest.

The proposal took place in Paris, because everything _important_ happened in Paris, and Anevka basked in the sensation of knowing she was the biggest fish in the pond that was political scandal and hearsay. She hoped the rumors hit Barcelona by the beginning of the next week.

Lotor proposed with a specially-picked ring, a bouquet, and a lovely evening on the Seine. There was no fancy dinner, because his species could apparently go for weeks without eating, and Anevka herself required no such things these days. There was dancing, and a boat ride, and a strategic balcony to kiss and tell upon.

The newspapers were in an uproar by the next morning. Young ladies whispered behind dainty lace gloves and old men grumbled with nothing to hide their words as Anevka and Lotor strode upon the city streets, arm in arm. They were the very picture of a modern, affianced couple.

Grandmother approved.

Seffie was jealous.

“I thought you weren’t interested in him?” Anevka prompted, while they met for what would have been tea if not for Seffie deciding that such a thing was unreasonably rude and uncouth to do while Anevka was the only guest.

Anevka was touched, truly.

“Not _him,” _Seffie said, with mild disgust that Anevka would even think to accuse her of something so frivolous. “Just the drama of it all. You’ll be the talk of Europa for _weeks,_ you know.”

“I know,” Anevka said, infusing her voice with all the smugness she couldn’t put on her face. “We’ve got some _grand_ plans for the wedding, you know. Tarvek’s taken it upon himself to be involved in all the details, poor thing.”

“You’re enjoying the chance to torture him.”

“Oh, absolutely.” Anevka laughed. “He’s working himself up into a tizzy, you know. Dreadfully unfortunate for him, but absolutely delightful for me. I could have sworn he was about to try murdering my dear fiancé with his bare hands the other day over an argument regarding the dress code. I doubt he would have succeeded, but it’s charming to see my _darling_ little brother take such an interest in my love life.”

Seffie rolled her eyes.

“Have you asked Colette to—”

“Anevka!”

“What? We can have our dalliances,” Anevka said. She’d have taken a sip of tea, were it an option, and stared knowingly at Seffie over the raised rim. “And we all know that Colette would_ certainly_ be a cleverly chosen one.”

“She is a _friend,” _Seffie stressed.

“Or more,” Anevka pushed. “You know, with the marvels of modern science, or even just taking on a male concubine for a week or two, a child would—”

Seffie threw a pillow at her.

Anevka laughed at her, and set the pillow on fire with a spark from her fingertips.

“You are _insufferable,”_ Seffie huffed.

“And you’re a child,” Anevka said as sweetly as she could. “Maybe it’s nap time?”

“Ugh!”

\--

“I don’t want to be doing this,” Tarvek said.

Lotor raised an eyebrow. “Then… don’t?”

“No, I have to,” Tarvek grumbled. He wasn’t sure if Anevka was going to be upset or not about him doing this, but that conversation could wait until she was on the other side of the galaxy or whatever the hell the plan was, because the conversation would be painful and uncomfortable and he wanted nothing to do with it.

Lotor folded his arms. “Very well, then. What is it that you need to do?”

Tarvek flicked his eyes to the ceiling, praying for Anevka to not find out about this, because she was going to tease him about it for the rest of time. Tarvek dropped his gaze, found Lotor expectant, and picked up the messenger bag he’d brought to this meeting.

He pushed it over, and tipped out the books inside.

“This is…”

“Our earlier conversation,” Tarvek said. He could feel the color rising in his cheeks. “As much as I wanted it to end, I had to admit that Anevka had a point.”

“Ah.”

“These two are just the pure biological processes,” Tarvek said, keeping his eyes on the papers. “The nerve structures, hormonal reactions, and so on. They’ll be useful in the treatment process, once it’s far enough along to matter. These three are… guidebooks, so to speak, regarding common practices to ensure consent and safety for the kind of, er… communities… that I am aware Anevka frequented prior to the accident.”

“Why do you know she frequented those communities?”

“I ran into her. Once. It was…” not the worst moment of his life, because the worst moments of his life were all wrapped up in her _dying,_ but still. “Incredibly awkward. We never spoke about it again.”

“I see. And the rest?”

“Novels that I have been informed are among her favorites. They, and two of the guidebooks, provide information on how to… engage. And stimulate. And encourage… pleasure.”

Lotor did not respond.

Tarvek wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.

The pregnant silence was bad.

A response might have been worse.

“I’m sure you have resources on your own—”

“Yes,” Lotor cut him off.

The silence came back.

“So—”

“Let’s not talk about this anymore.”

“Agreed.”

\--

There was something truly soothing about snapping the ribs of a dead man to root about his chest cavity.

Anevka wielded a scalpel like a conductor’s baton, or perhaps an artist’s pen. She liked to imagine she carved stories out of the corpses on her examination table, the words they could no longer say for themselves. It made her feel better about the what _she _couldn’t say.

Oh, scar tissue on the lungs? Tsk tsk, little corpse, should have taken better care of yourself. Didn’t they tell you tobacco could kill?

My, they were almost black with tar.

“Well, that certainly isn’t the color I expected of human organs.”

Anevka looked up. She waved hello, and very carefully did not let the blood spatter onto Lotor. That would be rude.

“He engaged in activities that caused a buildup of black contaminants,” she said. “When healthy, the color is much paler and pinker.”

“I see,” Lotor said. He crossed his arms and leaned back against a nearby table. “Might I ask _why_ you are cutting this person open?”

“Why, darling, can’t it just be for fun?” Anevka cooed.

He looked her up and down, almost judgmental. Well, that just wouldn’t do.

“I generally find,” he said carefully. “That if I am to engage in such activities simply for the pleasures they may bring, I will find myself turning into someone I’ve dedicated my life to hating.”

“Your father?”

He smiled, utterly humorless. “Mother, actually.”

Ah.

Hm.

“I had thought her deceased,” Anevka said, tone as light as she could manage. She focused on the flesh beneath her fingers, and made another cut. The blood welled in a way it shouldn’t have, this long after the death. “Along with… well, the rest.”

“She might as well be,” Lotor said.

The emotion was gone from his voice. Anevka wondered just what was going through that clever little head of his. She imagined just… popping it off and taking a rummage around, pulling out all those twisted little emotions and brilliant theories and buried rage.

The hair would get in the way, wouldn’t it? And it would be such a _shame_ to stain so lovely a thing.

“My own mother is dead,” Anevka said. “I may have told you. It is… not of much importance.”

This was a lie.

“I am sorry to hear it, but I thought as much.”

“Mm. Would you like to know something, my darling husband-to-be?”

“I rather fear what that something is,” he said. “But let’s hear it.”

Anevka looked up. She would have smiled. She wished she could. “Sentiment didn’t save her. It doesn’t save anyone. Not in this family.”

He watched her.

He didn’t just look. Didn’t examine. Didn’t probe. He watched, careful and waiting.

How dare he _not react._

“Not even me,” she said, sweet as spun sugar.

“Yes,” he said, soft and… ugh. _Caring._ “You told me as much. I don’t suppose you would stop me from _attempting_ to help out of sentiment?”

She wanted to rip his spleen out and feed it to him, the clever, calm, collected _bastard._

He probably didn’t even have a spleen.

She was putting her life in his hands for politics and he was pretending he actually _cared_ about her.

As a _person._

Nobody cared about her, not really, only _Tarvek, _and even that was more because he felt _obligated_ than because he actually _wanted to, _and—

A bone snapped under her hand.

She looked down, found blood and bone and sinew bursting through the gaps between her gloved fingers.

She’d crushed the cadaver’s arm.

_Geargrit and flames._

The odd susurrus of Lotor’s metal and leather coattails reached her auditory processors, and she caught the sight of his boots out the side of her lenses.

She snapped her head up and to the side and turned, so unnaturally smooth that she hardly knew she was doing it before she had the scalpel hovering a hairsbreadth from his jugular.

Anevka did not breathe, but she imagined she’d be doing so quite heavily if she’d had the chance.

Lotor brought his hand up slowly, and took hers in his fingers, and pushed it down. Gentle, the whole way. He kept his eyes on hers, and hardly even blinked to acknowledge her actions.

“I do not trust easily,” he said. “And neither do you or yours.”

She said nothing.

“I do not trust you yet,” he said. “I may never. I also do not love you, but we’ve not yet known each other a scant few months, and I have lived millennia. There is time for that. I do, however, find myself becoming quite fond of you as the time passes. I do not wish to see you fall down that same hateful, destructive path that I’ve seen others take.”

She yanked her arm away from him and stepped back.

He did not follow.

Lotor waited for her to speak, and then sighed. He did not shrink into himself, or put a hand to his face. He only moved a very little amount, but it was enough for Anevka to see that he was tired.

Of her, perhaps.

“My mother lost herself in her research,” Lotor said. “It poisoned her, and after an incident, she woke up unable to remember anything, not even her own name. She does not know I am her son, despite _giving birth_ after the incident. That poison lives in me, too, in some small amount. I know those risks, as chemicals and energy, but I also know that they are present in many worlds as nothing more than psychology. This Spark… it makes it so very easy to lose yourself in your sciences, to go down that same path. You already suffered for it.”

“I suffered for _my father’s—!”_

_“And I for my mother’s!”_ Lotor snapped. “My parents were—not perfect people, not even before, but they were not the monsters they are now. Her choices to dive so deep into something that was killing her destroyed not just her life, but my father’s sanity, my own being, entire _galaxies._ I know not your exact experiences, but trust me when I say that I know the cruelty of a parent who cares more for their own hubris and ambition than for those that love them.”

(Did he bleed?)

(Could she _make_ him?)

He took a half-step forward. He paused.

“Do you think you could, eventually, learn to trust me?”

“Do I have a choice?” Anevka spat.

His face twitched. “I should think so.”

“If I want to get out of this hell I’m in, then I don’t,” Anevka ground out, through gears instead of teeth and clenching jaw.

“That isn’t trust. It’s tolerance. Risk assessment.”

“What do you _want?”_ Anevka demanded. She got in his space, craning her head back to glare into his eyes. She couldn’t drop the ever-present half-smile, couldn’t make her eyes slide-half shut in a way that made them suspicious instead of seductive, couldn’t make her face do what she wanted… but she had her voice, and Anevka could hiss in rage like the best of them. “You’ve gotten what you came for in this arrangement. You’ll have your ties to the planet that hides the secrets you need. We had a dynamic. It was working. So why are you suddenly pretending to _fucking_ care?”

“Is it too much to think I haven’t gained some measure of fondness?” Lotor asked. “I like you. I find you fascinating. There is no small part of me that wishes to gain your trust for what it would mean to me as, if not a husband, then a friend.”

She grabbed his shoulders and twisted, slamming his back onto the open chest cavity she’d been working on, and leaned over him to get in his face. “Don’t _lie to me.”_

“I’m not,” he said. Calm.

So. Fucking. Calm.

Anevka kept the electricity coiled beneath her fingers, held tight under her casing and away from her fiancé. There was only so much she could do without jeopardizing her chance to get away from Sturmhalten for good.

Lotor shifted in discomfort, but his eyes stayed fixed on Anevka’s, pupils blown wide with something she didn’t care to identify.

The flicked down to her unmoving mouth, just a second’s motion, and back up to her eyes.

He—

How _dare_ he?

She was nothing worth attraction, not like _that,_ how dare he mock her for it by even putting up the _pretense of—_

“Perhaps it would be best if we were to separate until the morning,” he said. “I do believe we are no longer in a state to have productive conversation.

The _gall._

“Also, I’d rather like to get this blood off of my armor,” he said. “…Princess, do you—”

She shoved herself off him and stepped back. She crossed her arms. She did not say a word.

Her silence said more than any poisoned honey of a sentence could.

He hesitated, but did not bother to insult her with an excuse or, yet worse, an apology. He simply left.

Anevka vibrated for several long minutes, rage at war with self-pity, all burying the attraction she felt despite herself and her better judgement.

She turned back to the corpse and seethed at the mess of ribs and ruptured organs. What a _waste._

Quick fingers. Little movements. Careful changes. She’d fix what she’d broken in her haste and anger, and it would be fine. Everything would be fine. The autopsy wasn’t all for nothing.

She could fix this.

\--

Lotor was not present at breakfast, and Anevka ignored Tarvek’s questions. He asked them as though he’d taken to tiptoeing through conversation, like they were training on those nightingale floors again, and it was aggravating.

_Everything_ was aggravating.

“You’ve got your ‘I want to murder something that doesn’t deserve it’ expression on,” Tarvek said.

“I don’t _have_ expressions,” Anevka snapped back. They were done being cautious, it seemed.

“You could talk to him.”

“That’s what got me this angry in the first place.”

“He’s spent the entire night working on the remote systems,” Tarvek told her. “Didn’t sleep a wink, barely ate. I had to convince him to leave for a snack.”

“And I should care… why?”

Tarvek sighed. “Because I think he’s trying to apologize for… whatever you two argued about last night? All he’d say when I saw him was that you’d had a discussion and he overstepped a boundary.”

“He tried to convince me that he cares about me.”

“Is that a bad thing?”

“He acted like he wanted to _kiss me,”_ she hissed. “He pretended he didn’t have the strength to break me where I stood when I pushed him down for pretending he cares. He asked if I could grow to trust him and acted like I have a _choice.”_

“Maybe he does care,” Tarvek said.

“Maybe _nothing,”_ Anevka said, raising her voice and getting to her feet. “Nobody _cares,_ Tarvek! Not about me, not about _any_ of us! We don’t _get_ that luxury!”

Something flickered in Tarvek’s expression, and he quashed it before she could identify just what it was.

“He doesn’t _have_ to play our games,” Tarvek pointed out. “I spoke with Colette a few days ago; Albia had been considering arranging something with one of her princesses if you and Lotor didn’t work out. He has other options. He doesn’t even have to play nice, Anevka; he could just leave and not come back, or tell his father and come back with an army. He wouldn’t be doing this if he didn’t think a marriage, specifically to _you_, was worth it.”

Anevka sat back down, glaring.

“Just… maybe he actually _does_ care, ‘Nevka.”

“It’s an act, at best.”

“Or he knows what it’s like to feel helpless, and doesn’t want to make it worse?” Tarvek offered. “It doesn’t sound like he can do anything about his father most of the time. It’s not the same thing, but… if he relates on that, he might—”

“Stop.”

He did.

Anevka fumed while Tarvek ate. Father didn’t join them. Tinka was likely in such bad repair that she couldn’t even stand, _again._ Lotor was…

Ugh.

Working on her remote control adjustments.

The independence of movement modifications.

Was it cruel of her to resent him for doing so much?

Probably.

She wasn’t a very pleasant person, after all.

“Is it really that hard to believe people might care about you?” Tarvek asked. His voice was quiet and… almost hurt?

“I thought Father cared,” Anevka said. “Enough, at least.”

“I think we can say he’s not like Father,” Tarvek said. “And even if no one else does, I care. Doesn’t that mean something?”

Anevka laughed, short and barking and _clanking_. She could hear the bitterness in it. Metal did nothing to hide her doubt.

“I guess I’ll take that as my answer,” Tarvek muttered. He drained what was left of his coffee.

“Maybe I’ll take him seriously when I have a body again,” Anevka suggested. Tarvek didn’t flinch. “At least then there will be _something.”_

“Anevka—”

“Men only want one thing, after all. He’s gotten the politics, darling, he doesn’t need to _pretend_ when there’s no way to even get the only other thing anyone would want out of me.”

“Anevka,” Tarvek reprimanded, _sotto voce._

_“What?”_ she hissed, so viciously that she was almost surprised that there was no steam coming from the grate at her throat.

“Isn’t that just a sign that, maybe, he’s actually genuine?”

Anevka let the silence speak for itself. No need to say what everyone already knew.

(Especially when she was seconds away from fiddling with a knife on the subject, and the rational part of her mind just _knew_ that she’d regret killing Tarvek if she actually went through with it.)

A knock came at the door.

Anevka shot a look at the doorman, and he nodded slightly.

The heavy doors swung open to reveal Lotor, and…

Hm.

Had he heard the conversation?

(Did she care if he had?)

His expression was neutral, neither pleasant nor offended. He showed no sign of having heard the conversation, nor any sign of… anything, really. Was he going to pretend that their conversation the night before had never happened?

(Did she want him to?)

“It’s ready.”

“What, really?” Tarvek asked, surprised and most certainly not faking it. “I thought we had another week, at least.”

“I managed to streamline the programming last night after it occurred to me to use the fourth-dimensional relays often used for imperial Galran communications. I’ve had to adjust the settings, of course, but they should be impervious to external interference now. If you would like to join me in the laboratories to look them over?”

“Of course,” Tarvek said, wiping his face and getting to his feet. “Anevka, are you—”

“Would I not?” Anevka asked, cutting him off. “What is the anticipated time of completion for the separation procedure?”

“Tonight, if all goes well,” Lotor said. He inclined his head, and stepped aside, gesturing through the doorway. “After you, madame.”

She did not meet his eyes as she strode through the arch. She could not.

Freedom was at her fingertips, so close she could almost feel it. Not full freedom, not true, but more than she had since her father had—

No.

No time for such thoughts.

There was work to be done.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Half of this chapter was written while listening to Emilie Autumn's discography on repeat and it shows. It's been years and I'm still bitter that Opheliac isn't on Spotify. (The Opheliac companion album is, but Opheliac itself is not. I don't get it.)
> 
> I was going to have them start making out on top of a corpse but I'm pretty sure we're a little past that right now for Anevka. She might have actually tried to kill him if he went for it.  
Well. "Making out." A few kisses. She doesn't really... have proper lips right now. Or sensation.  
(This is like. Polar opposite energy from Gilvek.)
> 
> Some gems from my conversations with my betas:
> 
> Every time I want to move the relationship forward, Anevka's there like "fuck you, nobody loves me and I will MAKE it true if it's not."
> 
> "I am being shown An Affection, I must obviously become violent."  
Like. Girl. In what world is that a reasonable reaction.  
This chapter is like 75% Nonsense Humor and then we get to "Anevka brutalizes a dead guy while Lotor expresses An Emotion"
> 
> Anevka, seeing the men in her life feel hurt or defensive about their deficiencies being pointed out, or doing something she deems Stupid due to sentiment or morality: Oh, how adorable [fifty exclamation heart emojis]  
"Oh, he's so squeamish about torture! How cute. Maybe I can hold his hand while he inserts the scalpel..."
> 
> Lotonevka is beauty and the beast but they're both convinced the other person is the beauty and they're the beast.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been meaning to write this for like a year.


End file.
